By: Dean Weiner
The West 30’s are going to to get a new neighborhood to go with its new and improved Penn Station. The Empire State Development Corporation is planning to destroy the existing area in order to build a new cluster of skyscrapers.
According to The New York Post, the government says about 473 businesses and 128 residences will be lost. Kathy Hochul’s plan to seize and raze properties in the area in order to make way for 10 new skyscrapers, is backed by Mayor Adams, however New Yorkers themselves are sickened by the notion.
Empire State Development (ESD) is the umbrella organization for New York’s two principal economic development public-benefit corporations, the New York State Urban Development Corporation (UDC) and the New York Job Development Authority (JDA). The New York State Department of Economic Development (DED) is a department of the New York government that has been operationally merged into ESD.
Some of the many historic landmarks that are to be bulldozed include St. Francis Catholic Church, the Gimbel’s sky bridge, and the Hotel Pennsylvania. The area is also home to one of the last recording studios on West 30th Street. Musician Steve Marshall told The New York Post, “almost every major musician in New York has either lived, rehearsed, or recorded on West 30th Street”.
Going back even further in time, the nonprofit Lithuanian Alliance of America (LAA) has occupied the brownstone for the past 112 years. The location was the first port of call for newly arrived Lithuanian immigrants before they boarded trains at Penn Station bound for coal mines in Pennsylvania, steel mills in Pittsburgh or stock yards in Chicago. The brownstone from 1876 stores the genealogy records for more than 100,000 Lithuanians who moved to the US from 1886 to 2012.
“If we lost this building, we would lose our history,” LAA board member Antanas ‘Tony’ Dambriunas said to The New York Post. “More than 100 years of our history and culture would be gone. Generations of memories would be gone. It would hurt.”
After serving beers for 17 years inside Penn Station, sports bar Tracks was turfed out in 2019 to make way for the current renovations. The owners were not financially compensated by the state.
Three days after Tracks owners reopened their bar across the street from Penn Station, Cuomo released plans to bulldoze Tracks’ new home on West 31st between Seventh and Eighth Avenues. If Tracks is kicked out again to make way for new office towers, the bar owners will not be able to afford to start over for a third time.
“We may get thrown out by the MTA again,” co-owner Michael O’Brien said. “After COVID, and with the economy like it is, we could not afford to open a third place.”
“It’s been a long road and it is all very uncertain, which is frustrating.”