To Keep An Eye On: 527 Grand Street & Luther Gulick Playground

Last month, Bowery Boogie reported that the building at 527 Grand Street, home to the People Choice Pharmacy, went on the market for $5.4 million. Dating back to 1857, this structure at the intersection of Grand and Henry, has long served as some sort of deli/grocery/pharmacy for the surrounding public and coop housing. Listings for 527 Grand Street prominently advertise the air rights that come with the purchase, almost 550 feet for a new residential building or over 4,000 for a commercial building –– the sky's the limit for your dream corner property.

Two blocks down Columbia will bring you to Luther Gulick Playground, a desolate stretch behind the Amalgamated Dwellings (one of the oldest housing cooperatives in the United States), named after Luther Gulick, the "Godfather of Basketball", NYC public school advocate, and founder of the Public School Athletic League. The playground was built in the early 1930's, originally as the Bernard Downing Playground (named after the recently deceased minority leader of the NYS Senate), and was renamed after Gulick in 1985. In the early 2000's, during the city's attempts to contain the infestations of Asian Longhorn Beetles, many of the trees within and around the playground were cut down. Soon after, community groups and local residents began campaigning for the park's restoration, convincing the city to allocate money to the project. While the design stage for the new park began in 2011, construction will begin on Luther Gulick Playground next month, coinciding with the broader push to compensate for the East River Park's eventual closure.

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A Hidden Lower East Side

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