By Raanan Geberer
Brooklyn Daily Eagle

BROOKLYN HEIGHTS -- Although the Landmarks Preservation Commission has approved a plan for an underground parking garage, covered by landscaping, at the historic Riverside Apartments, the complex’s tenants’ association continues to dispute the plan.

The garage would replace an area in the complex’s courtyard that has been paved over since 1991 and used for parking. A previous plan configuring the garage as a low-rise building covered by a garden was rejected earlier this year by the commission.

The tenants’ group has hired the law firm of Collins Dobkin Miller – not to initiate legal action, but to represent them at the New York State Division of Housing and Community Renewal (DHCR). The DHCR must give its approval before the work can proceed.

Bill Ringler, chair of the Riverside Tenants Association, says that the owner, the Pinnacle Group, and its architect, Lee Weintraub Landscape Architecture, have presented “some beautiful drawings,� but not all of them may be accurate.

He said the type of trees portrayed in the rendering that was reproduced in the Eagle for Nov. 19 “can’t grow in three feet of soil [above the garage],� and that they appear to be about 10 years old – not trees that are newly planted.

“We don’t know what they really plan,� he said. An existing grove of trees would have to be removed to make way for the underground garage.

When the area of the courtyard in question was paved over, he said, the DHCR interpreted this as a reduction in building services, and froze rents. If and when the garage is built, he added, the landlord will file to raise rents as soon as possible.

Ken Fisher, partner in the Real Estate and Environmental and Land Use Practice Groups of the law firm WolfBlock, is representing Pinnacle. Of the Landmarks decision, he said, “We are extremely gratified.� He pointed out that the original paving of the courtyard was done under a previous owner, and that “the current owner has already invested $2 million in upgrading the property.�

Furthermore, he said, garage space is at a premium in the neighborhood. “The State Street garage,� he said, “has a 90-car capacity, and it has a 90-car waiting list.�

Furthermore, he said, the garage will be first and foremost for the Riverside complex’s residents. Spaces that are unused, he said, will then be rented to the community on a monthly basis. “We won’t have any one-day parkers, like the garage at Cadman Plaza West,� he said.

As for the continued opposition to the garage, Fisher, well known in the area as a former City Councilman, said that “landlord-tenant relations have always been contentious in New York� and that some people are suspicious of change in general.

As was mentioned in the Eagle of Nov. 20, other prominent neighborhood residents have objected to the garage plans. One of these is Judy Stanton, executive director of the Brooklyn Heights Association, who raised the question of automotive fumes invading the garden. She also pointed out that the rendering didn’t show any of the cars that would be entering and leaving the space.

The Riverside Apartments were built in 1890 by philanthropist and businessman Alfred Tredway White as improved housing for workers, providing more light and air than typical "old law" tenements of the period. Part of the complex and courtyard were demolished in the 1940s for the construction of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway.

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