Another Sunset Parker Bemoans Gentrification

A blog called Fuzzy Logic has a post about the (recent?) changes in SP. While she calls Bay Ridge "Chinese-Ruled" (news to me) and she states that One Sunset Park is the first condo building starting up (check out 7th and 8th Avenues in the high 40's and 50's), her main concern is one that a lot of us probably struggle with when we see UHauls chugging around looking for parking (or, more recently, holding a parking spot with trash cans...a big NO NO according to the many residents who loudly voiced their annoyance).

from the blog:

In a few years, the best taco shops and authentic Brooklyn pizza shops will be gone, replaced by chains and migrating hipsters from Williamsburg. Not to sound bitter, 'coz we sure can use a descent coffee shop and less 99c store... but I don't want to trade ma & pa's shops for yet another generic-face-lift-blah store. Oy, the dilemma!

I don't think she'll have to wait a few years for there to be severe changes (although Johnny's isn't going anywhere)...and I'm not so sure we'll be getting any "decent" coffee shops any time soon (La Gran Via is much more than decent anyway), but there is a definite chance that we'll be losing more and more stores to landlords' desires to raise rents...I know of very few store fronts that have been filled recently. Only 5th Avenue seems to be making any headway, and that takes a long, long time. 8th, 7th, and 6th all have plenty of rental space for small business to snap up, but there aren't any takers.