Community shocked as plug pulled on historic power plant

The old Con Ed building at 500 Kent Ave. is in jeopardy of being demolished. The old building in the Williamsburg district of Brooklyn sits along the East River and the area is now becoming peppered with more and more high-end residential buildings. (Photo by Katya Pronin / April 17, 2008)

By David Freedlander, amNewYork Staff Writer
More stories | dfreedlander@am-ny.com

April 18, 2008

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A monumental century-old power plant sitting on the Brooklyn waterfront and featuring a stout stone foundation and 4-story high arched windows with cream colored terra-cotta trim is being demolished brick by brick, upsetting local preservationists.

The Kent Avenue Powerhouse dates to 1905 and provides a crucial link to the city's transportation history, at one point providing the juice for the original Brooklyn Rapid Transit company. It was the site of a devastating 1937 strike that lead to the formation of the Transit Workers Union.

"We are losing a lot of grand power plants but this is probably the most stunning," said Mary Habstritt, president of the Society for Industrial Architecture. "It tells the whole story of our subway system.

"How can we talk about sustainability if we are going to just throw all those bricks and ornamental iron work into a landfill," Habstritt said.

Chris Olert, a spokesman for Con Edison, which bought the power plant from the city in 1950 and kept it operational until 1999, confirmed that the building was being demolished but said no plans had been made for the site's future.

Last year, a beaux-arts waterside power plant in Manhattan was razed to make room for an enormous new residential project by developer Sheldon Solow.

Also last year, a former power station in Long Island City was converted into condominiums by the architect Karl Fischer. Preservationists prefer that as opposed to demolition.

"Large buildings like that are great adaptive reuse projects," said Lisa Kersavage, director of advocacy for the Municipal Art Society, citing the Brooklyn Navy Yard as an example.

"The industry on the waterfront is really what saved Brooklyn, and that is going to be forgotten," Kersavage said.

Some, though, want to see the building come down and the land quickly turned over to community.

"Right now it's an eyesore that's way out of context for the neighborhood," said Evan Thies, a local activist. "This is the 100-year-old problem of New York, that we don't have access to the waterfront. ... We can move industry and utilities to other parts of the city and the borough that are much less desirable."

The building was brought before the city's Landmarks Preservation Committee last year, but was rejected. Lisi de Bourbon, a spokeswoman for the agency, said it could be reconsidered at a later date, but with the scaffolding already up, locals fear it already may be too late.

"It's a wonderful building but without the political will I don't see anything happening," said Ward Dennis, founding member of the Waterfront Preservation Alliance of Williamsburg and Greenpoint.