When people hear “Sheepshead Bay”, they always think about the big beautiful houses and small local business surrounding the bay area. The bay is a portion that separates Coney Island from Manhattan Beach. It has a small boardwalk where many of the local businesses have settled down for years. People know the area to be a small and close friendly neighborhood. However, there are more sightings of condos being built in this neighborhood that was once filled with big houses and small stores. In this ethnographic fieldwork, I am going to investigate how the residents of the Bay are responding to the construction of condos being built around the area. This investigation will focus on how the construction of condos for people outside of the Sheepshead Bay community affects the community residents. Although subtle, the construction of condos is known to bring in people of different class, ethnicities, gender, and race to the community already residing there. Many residents of the Sheepshead Bay area cannot deny that it is one of the most warming and beautiful areas located in Brooklyn. The area was named Sheepshead due to the fish that was predominately seen in the water but can no longer be found today. Sheepshead Bay is interesting because the area used to be filled with small one-family houses but condos have been appearing a lot more often the past few years. To conduct this fieldwork, I will focus on one specific area of the Bay which is at the corner of Sheepshead Bay Road and Emmons Avenue. It used to be a well-known diner called El Greco but is being turned into a condo apartment with a 9,000-square foot public plaza. The destruction of El Greco not only upset residents but angered them because it was a family diner that everyone knew about.
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The business started in 1970s and was passed down for 40 years in the Venetoklis family. The community knew the Venetoklis as humble and caring. Every Thanksgiving they hosted a traditional feast that would feed 600 people. Many residents of Sheepshead Bay say that the area will never be the same. The 90,000-square foot area is now being used to develop a 58-unit condo called The Vue. The building itself is only allowed for recreational businesses. City planners believe it is a proper site to build the condo because there are many conveniently close businesses like Applebee’s, Loehmann’s, Chase, and Bally’s Fitness that will attract buyers. City planner Robert Moses destroyed communities to make the neighborhood more “urban”. His urban renewal projects like the Cross-Bronx Expressway displaced families already living in the area. Although he knew about this displacement, he continued with his plan to create a way for cars to drive through the Bronx. His project did not concern with the lower-class population living in the area, but more towards the middle and upper class who had automobiles to travel. The construction of the condo connects to ideas used in urbanism where a community was destroyed to make something city planners believed were more suitable for the area. This is similar to urbanism because city planners are destroying something that the community needs for something that will bring in a new wave of people into the neighborhood. The construction of the condo also brings calamity to the scenic views of the bay because of the high rise. There are many big mansions and family houses that were built since the beginning of the 1930s. These homes are what makes the bay area so beautiful. When driving by, many like me are enamored by the beautiful designs and architecture of the structures. El Greco being located at the corner of Emmons Avenue made is easily accessible for residents to have a great time and enjoy the scenic view. However, the construction of the condo now blocks this scenic view that the bay is known for. There is a saying “every end is a new beginning”. This saying could be related to the investigation because the end of a 40-year family business that residents adored lead to the beginning of a high rise condo where new residents will move in. I hope to learn the socio-spatial processes that
The business started in 1970s and was passed down for 40 years in the Venetoklis family. The community knew the Venetoklis as humble and caring. Every Thanksgiving they hosted a traditional feast that would feed 600 people. Many residents of Sheepshead Bay say that the area will never be the same. The 90,000-square foot area is now being used to develop a 58-unit condo called The Vue. The building itself is only allowed for recreational businesses. City planners believe it is a proper site to build the condo because there are many conveniently close businesses like Applebee’s, Loehmann’s, Chase, and Bally’s Fitness that will attract buyers. City planner Robert Moses destroyed communities to make the neighborhood more “urban”. His urban renewal projects like the Cross-Bronx Expressway displaced families already living in the area. Although he knew about this displacement, he continued with his plan to create a way for cars to drive through the Bronx. His project did not concern with the lower-class population living in the area, but more towards the middle and upper class who had automobiles to travel. The construction of the condo connects to ideas used in urbanism where a community was destroyed to make something city planners believed were more suitable for the area. This is similar to urbanism because city planners are destroying something that the community needs for something that will bring in a new wave of people into the neighborhood. The construction of the condo also brings calamity to the scenic views of the bay because of the high rise. There are many big mansions and family houses that were built since the beginning of the 1930s. These homes are what makes the bay area so beautiful. When driving by, many like me are enamored by the beautiful designs and architecture of the structures. El Greco being located at the corner of Emmons Avenue made is easily accessible for residents to have a great time and enjoy the scenic view. However, the construction of the condo now blocks this scenic view that the bay is known for. There is a saying “every end is a new beginning”. This saying could be related to the investigation because the end of a 40-year family business that residents adored lead to the beginning of a high rise condo where new residents will move in. I hope to learn the socio-spatial processes that