Tonight: Permanent Fort Greene Plaza Up for a Vote at Brooklyn CB 2

A reminder for readers who live in and around Fort Greene: The Brooklyn Community Board 2 transportation committee is taking up the matter of Fowler Square plaza tonight, and if you head over to 180 Remsen Street to weigh in, you can help this new public space become a permanent neighborhood fixture.

NYC DOT installed the plaza with temporary materials this spring and began evaluating its impact on traffic and street life. The agency will present the results of that study this evening before the committee vote.

If you’ve walked by the temporary plaza at the triangle where Fulton Street and South Elliott Place meet, you’ve probably seen that it’s quickly become a very well-used gathering place. The businesses around the plaza either appreciate it as a neighborhood amenity, or simply don’t mind the change to the street grid. Still, it’s hardly a given that the upgrade to a permanent plaza will sail through the CB 2 committee.

For whatever reason, this plaza project has brought out some especially outlandish NIMBY behavior from a small band of opponents. One early planning workshop was disrupted by a plaza antagonist who argued, “This is a city, not the country.” Anonymous flyers were distributed before the plaza opened, predicting it would “split the neighborhood apart.”

So you can bet the CB 2 committee will be hearing it from them tonight. If you’d like the committee to hear from you, too, the meeting gets started at 6:00 p.m. at St. Francis College, 180 Remsen Street.