Dumbo, Brooklyn: Preserved in Amber. Sort Of.

It’s sad it’s changed sadly. Too many tourists destroyed the charm

I know these articles are usually upbeat, but I'm really surprised there's no menion of the fact that Dumbo, more than any other area of the city west of Coney Island, is under the water line, a point dramatically made when Sandy hit. Rising water is already a big problem for this area and will only get a lot bigger.

I've lived up the hill from DUMBO since it was where artists used to go for stuff NYC deposed at the old Purchase Dept. warehouse. Then it was used in countless movies, and bodies were dumped there in "The Sopranos." I used to go there often—it is a few minutes walk from where I live—but it, and my local subway stations, have been overwhelmed with tourists in the last few years. Brooklyn Bridge Park now has several millions visitors a year. The Brooklyn Bridge itself was at a standstill a few weeks ago with all the tourists trying to walk across. A friend of mine who had his work studio there was squeezed out by the "Two Trees" Walentas family after the neighborhood got trendy and his artistic presence was no longer needed. Same thing with the excellent PS Bookshop and Powerhouse Books. As Yogi Berra said, "It's too crowded; no one goes there any more."

The commentary on the local public school is misleading. DUMBO was only recently re-zoned for 307. Most kids of test-taking age living in DUMBO go to PS8 in Brooklyn Heights, which has significantly higher test scores. You can bet the 307 test scores will improve dramatically in the next few years.

Nobody ever mentions the exhaust fumes floating down from the Williamsburg Bridge. That was the first thing that struck me when I visited there.

"If Dumbo is a blast from the past, it is hardly a museum... The furniture company West Elm has its headquarters at Empire Stores... Other tenants of Empire Stores include the restaurant Cecconi’s Dumbo, offering cocktail-fueled river-gazing. Time Out Market, a food hall with a roof deck, is slated to open there this spring." There is literally a museum on the second floor of this building...

Dumbo was once known for such must-haves as the bespoke burritos and free-range pale ale, but what about the annual artist open studios? Still plenty of artist studios in Dumbo or have they been converted into such must-haves as a baby's mudroom?

Used to lead tours of the Brooklyn Bridge, starting in Dumbo, in the eighties - then moved out to Southampton where the Walentas were doing whatever they pleased, and often came in conflict with the Planning Board, with their sense of entitlement and privilege, it was obvious they felt insulated from rules by their wealth. I will never forget Jane reacting to the Planning Board telling her to take down a sign, she stands up from the public hearing, hair flying, and starts crying, What are they trying to do to us?? she whimpered..It seemed like overacting, and the Planning Board has the good sense to laugh out loud, as a group, at her antics...It was a remarkable moment.. Too bad the Walentas's took over DUMBO - it really taints it for me.

"We used to have a neighborhood that was dead end." Perhaps, but not for very long. For much longer, it wasn't quite a "neighborhood." I remember Dumbo when it was almost purely industrial and no one lived there. Oh, eventually the projects were built, necessitating the tearing down of the tiny house on Sands Street where my mother's older sister was born in 1918, but that's also relatively modern history. Now it is residential, and tourists come. Of course. When you have streets leading to a river or a harbor, tourists will be there. I guess these people should've moved to Flatbush.