speaking of alpacas, check out these goats that live in prospect park now

Photos: These Goats Are Now Roaming Prospect Parkhttps://t.co/5bj5mQ3bZP pic.twitter.com/Tk5uWEW5tK

— Gothamist (@Gothamist) May 18, 2016

speaking of recent brooklyn animal activity

Visited the famous, rare vagrant #PaintedBunting in #ProspectPark, #Brooklyn today! 🍃 @NYCAudubon #birding #birds pic.twitter.com/qOZrVZEmU6

— JBishop Studios (@JBishopStudios) January 2, 2016

there are some notably good free concerts at prospect park this summer!

here are the ones i care about:

wednesday, june 4 : janelle monae
friday, june 20 : dum dum girls - hospitality - teen
saturday, june 21 : warpaint - yellowbirds
thursday, june 26 : shovels & rope - valerie june - shakey graves
friday, august 8 : st. vincent - san fermin

you can see them all here!

the president arrives in style in brooklyn

RT @nym_hospital: From the roof of NYM: Obama coming in for a landing in Prospect Park in his helicopter, Marine One pic.twitter.com/FO82JsCXta

— Curbed NY (@CurbedNY) October 25, 2013

NeRd aLeRt!

Yesterday, The New York Times published an article about architect Charles Pierrepont Henry Gilbert (Jeez, leave some names for the rest of us, Mr. Selfish).  While he may be known for designing high-end townhouses along Fifth and Madison Avenues, including the Jewish Museum at 1109 Fifth Avenue, he also designed a number of quirky neo-Gothic and Romanesque townhouses around Grand Army Plaza.  He designed practically every house on Montgomery Place.  Be sure to look up each and everyone of them on Googmaps.

I remember these one from riding bikes to Prospect Park!
This is my favorite because of the interesting brickwork.  What's yours?

Also, I enjoyed this little tibit:

In 1897 Charles N. Howard (One of Gilbert's clients), who lived at No. 838, was knocked over by a cyclist riding on the sidewalk at Grand Army Plaza. The rider disappeared, and Mr. Howard sued the city for his broken arm. The municipal defense — that it “was known to all residents in the neighborhood” that bicycle riders routinely rode on the sidewalks — did not fly. Mr. Howard received $25,000.

Residents around Prospect Park complaining about cyclists?  I guess some things never change.

snufflez.

(via)

what are you doing tonight?

andrew bird is playing a free show at the prospect park bandshell.

ride your bike. see you there!

adventure buddies.

goose holocaust.

They have been a familiar sight around the lake in Prospect Park in Brooklyn: Canada geese, scores of them. To some residents, the birds and their fuzzy offspring are charming hints of wildlife amid the bricks of the city. Recently, when one was found with an arrow through its neck, park rangers tried to corral it to administer first aid.

But then, over the last few days, parkgoers noticed something strange.

The geese were gone. Nearly 400 of them.

On Monday, the answer emerged. Wildlife biologists and technicians had descended on the park Thursday morning and herded the birds into a fenced area. The biologists, working with the federal Agriculture Department, then packed the geese two or three to a crate and took them to a nearby building where they were gassed with lethal doses of carbon dioxide, Carol A. Bannerman, a spokeswoman, said. (via)

DAYUM!

marty markowitz is a rah-tard.

this weekend, i learned that there was a such thing as the president of manhattan (thx lilly). this lead me to the obvious next question - can you be the president of brooklyn? the answer's yes, and i now have a new life goal.

i was pleased this morning, while listening to WNYC, to learn that my path to the brooklyn white house might be a little less challenging than i thought, given that brooklyn's current president, marty markowitz, is some kind of mentally disabled person. let me explain:

tonight, there will be a purblic meeting regarding the conversion of one traffic lane on prospect park west into a two-way bike lane. sounds great! what's not to like, right? i was pedaling for my life on PPdubz just this weekend.

well, mr. markowitz was interviewed this morning, and turns out he is a staunch supporter of car drivers' rights in brooklyn, and is opposing this new initiative. it seems he also opposed restricting car access to prospect park a few years back.

he thinks there's already too much traffic on PPW, that if we lose a lane to bikes, every car owner in brooklyn will pack their lives up into their beloved automobiles and drive out of the city forever. he also said that if you want to bike north on PPW (the opposite direction of the nearby bike path inside the park), that the sidewalks are just enormous, and there are hardly any pedestrians, so just use the sidewalk, ok?! that's ILLEGAL!, not to mention dangerous.

here's a really good part, too:

AB: On those summer events, there are that people who drive, but, there is huge pedestrian traffic, there is huge bicycle traffic. Is there an issue of the greater good here, who would benefit the most and looking from ten thousand feet up?

MM: I would challenge your assertion that there is huge bicycle use. I would challenge you on it. As someone who lived across the street from it I would challenge you. There is modest bicycle use. Modest. At best. But that’s not the point. There has to be a balance. And that’s why I supported Ninth Street. I think the two-way bicycle lanes will cause a great inconvenience to the residents of Prospect Park West and I don’t want to be blamed, because they’re going to move ahead with this as you know, I don’t want to be blamed, and that’s why I took this interview with you. I don’t want to be blamed. On the other hand, I hope that the commissioner and the department is right. If they’re right, and in fact it causes no bottlenecks, no inconvenience, and if it works, I’ll be the first to say I was wrong. I would.

AB: You don’t seem to much care for Janette Sadik-Khan. You’ve called her a zealot, why?

MM: She is a zealot. I can tell you this much — I respect her professionalism. She personally is a very nice woman. I think she’s a professional — I know she’s a professional. We just disagree in certain instances where I’m acutely aware that she wants to make it hard for those that choose to own their automobiles. She wants to make it difficult, their life difficult. I really believe that.
Bernstein: Why, why would she want to do that?

MM: Well, I think because she would like to see more people stop car usage and get on their bicycles. Or walk.

AB: Is that an unworthy goal?

MM: Within reason it is a worthy goal. If I personally walk more than I currently walk and use the bicycle more than I currently use it just for pleasure I probably would be in much better shape, for sure.

anyway, sorry for the rant. just got my goop gobbled up good this morning. a brooklyn borough president who favors the needs of automobile drivers over providing safe environments for the growing number of bike enthusiasts, well that just doesn't make any sense, am i right? don't worry, i'll be sure to vote next time, for myself.

bonus links:
brooklyn by bike
livable streets
celebrate brooklyn! bike zone
ride the city

from-a-to-p-park.

In the 1970s, Prospect Park in Brooklyn looked more like a crime scene than the pastoral refuge imagined a century earlier by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux.

As if to advertise the woeful state of the park, in 1976 Columbia, the figure driving atop the arch at Grand Army Plaza, fell over in her chariot, a victim of disrepair.
...
Three decades later, Ms. Thomas, who plans to announce her retirement on Tuesday, has become a Brooklyn institution and is widely seen as the park’s indefatigable savior.

Her fans credit her with turning Prospect Park into a worthy rival to Central Park, and for handing a lost treasure of wilderness and recreation back to the people of Brooklyn. (via)

swan jerks.

looks like the p-park lake is only big enough for ONE swan family!

"The southern father — wings beating, back hunched and neck extended — streaks across the lake with a wake behind him and repeatedly jumps on members of the other family. It looks as if he’s trying to drown them." (via)

thx sj!