“See you in Brooklyn!” were the parting words for many Columbia graduates last spring as they packed up their EC townhouses and headed to Bushwick and Greenpoint in search of low rent and big sky. But the jeune BoBo outer-borough experience is not for everyone. Such is case for the young graduate who finds himself in Stuyvesant Town, a 110-building complex developed in 1947 for World War II veterans and middle class families as a “suburb in the city.”
With a 24-hour security staff, residence ID card-carrying policies and borderline fascistic aesthetic, Stuy Town appears to be part-gated community, part-college campus, part-utopia. "Most people think it's a housing project at first," said Marc Tracy, CC '07, of his Stuy Town apartment building. Despite a 2007 renovation that brought Stuy Town a putting green, an in-house library, gym, lounge and entertainment center, vestiges of Cold-War era conformity remain. The complex's Web site depicts the Stuy Town Resident—his life, work, and recreation—as the admirable, if not glorious, apotheosis of the young professional.
An image of a strong-jawed banker-type whispering into the ear of svelte downtown hipster alternates with a photo of two sports-bra-clad girlfriends gossiping in the midst of cardio intervals on side-by-side stairmasters. A gallery featuring residents enjoying the various neighborhood amenities recalls the Socialist Realist posters of Maoist China: always smiling, always productive, and always filled with the Spirit of Community, these young twentysomethings embody the Stuy Town marketing motto of "love your space." “After college there’s no longer that community of young people living together so it was nice to have what they give you—to just be able to have beers on the lawn on a Saturday afternoon with your neighbors,” said Stuy Town denizen Alissa Ochs, CC '07.
But the command to love one's neighbor isn't for everyone. "Sure, there are plenty of people who are into the community and amenities, but I couldn't care less about what's going on in the Oval," said Tracy, referring to the complex's central green lawn and event hosting space. He also takes issue with the ubiquitous planters—filled with cabbages, in an appropriately practical Soviet touch—that line the sidewalks. "I'd rather they put the money towards lowering my rent."
Some posts on the Stuy Town Facebook group's wall also call into question the supposed sense of neighborhood solidarity. One jejune newcomer, Max Teets, posts: "hey im the guy with the blue boombox always playing music, come say hi," only to be rebuked by embittered long-term resident Violaine Esnault: "We do welcome new people in Stuyvesant but the new folks are rude un neighborly people we are used to knowing everyone not nasty rude yuppies."
Not all "new folks," are yuppies. In fact, some are even their opposites: downtown arts students. In 2007, Stuy Town contracted with NYU, The New School, and The Art Institute of New York to house students during the school year. With the influx of what an October 2009 article thecalled hordes of “students, singles and hipsters with wild parties and frat-house antics,” Stuy Town has certainly shed its original suburban oasis vibe and adopted the Daily News aura of an EC townhouse. This fact became perhaps no more obvious than in May when reports were published on Gothamist and in New York magazine's Daily Intel of a drunken resident defecating in a Stuy Town stairwell.
Although Tracy and his roommate, Andrew Russeth, CC '07, claim not to have hosted parties of Frat Row proportions, they admit that noise complaints have been filed against them. Initially confused by the complaint, they learned upon further investigation that their downstairs neighbors objected specifically to Russeth, an early riser with an apparently heavy footfall. The plaintiffs? None other than a different pair of persnickety Columbia alums.
-- Mariela Quintana
No comments:
Post a Comment