As the first chill of the declivity time of year settled over Red Hook , Barry O’Meara stood outside his Browning automatic rifle , theBait & Tackle , in a thick knit cardigan , pondering the future . “ I have two years leave behind on my lease , ” he said , as the sounds of live music emanate from inside . “ Is it profitable ? Not at all . But it ’s a hell of a lot of fun . ”

The interrogation now is whether the same type of play can continue in a part of townsfolk where monolithic modification might be underway .

For the last several decades , this comparatively stranded Brooklyn peninsula that juts into the New York Harbor has cope to sustain the quieten vibe of a small seaside village where , as O’Meara said , “ Everyone know your name and what you had for breakfast before you get out of bottom . ” But last calendar month , the specter of progress threaten to change everything . AECOM , a global engineering firm , liberate an elaborate 61 - page “ framework to explore potential development scenarios of Southwest Brooklyn ” – with much of the direction on Red Hook . The document calls for a monolithic buildup of fresh trapping and three new subway quit .

Red Hook

AECOM Renderings|AECOM

In a far - flung neighborhood of close to 11,000 people , located more than a mil from the nearest subway station – about eight minutes by railway car , 15 by bus ( without dealings ) – the idea of developers swooping in and interrupt everything is intelligibly controversial .

“ There ’s a deal of mixed emotions , ” say Billy Durney , who openedHometown Bar - vitamin B - Quehere in 2013 . “ masses sing about skyscrapers and wagon train , it ’s like coming into a little pool and throw down a tsunami . ”

Of course , Red Hook knows a thing or two about massive ocean flooding . In 2012 , Hurricane Sandy ravage the arena . But it was that small - town ethos of the community , where everyone helped each other , that many of the locals say got them through the disaster .

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“ I swear , when Sandy reach , I was like , ‘ That ’s it , compact it up , ’ ” tell Sohui Kim , who can now laugh about surviving that instinctive catastrophe . “ But , oh , the resiliency of the residential area . ”

Kim , a chef , moved to Red Hook in 2002 with her husband , Ben Schneider , a carpenter and actor . Four long time later , they open up a little eating house with old - Earth charm on Van Brunt St call The Good Fork . “ There is a sure eccentric that gravitate to Red Hook , ” she said . “ It ’s not an easy place to get to . You had to be committed . ”

That commitment was readily apparent during Sandy ’s aftermath . Ask anyone who lived here in the storm ’s wake and they ’ll tell you plenty of stories about neighbors shift in to deal supplies and pump water out of each other ’s basement . Durney ’s restaurant was slammed with 6 ft of body of water , just months before its grand opening . Undaunted , he raise up a stag party mighty out on the street and cooked thousands of pounds of donated core to serve feed athirst hurricane victims . Scandinavian retailer IKEA , which operates a monumental warehouse - like store nearby , donated piece of furniture and blank space for disaster relief efforts . And a coalition of local business possessor and stakeholder , Restore Red Hook , raised nearly $ 500,000 in stand-in funds to be portion out among its penis .

Sunny’s Bar, Red Hook

Sunny’s Bar|Flickr/Brian Luster

The area did n’t always finger so isolated . Through the 1940s , Red Hook ’s shipping industry was booming , employing up to 60,000 nautical worker at its peak in 1950 . But over the next 20 years , the jobs all but disappeared as shipping companies leave alone the port and moved to New Jersey . By the 1990s , the neighborhood was , as author and former inhabitant Tim Sultan describes inSunny ’s Nights : Lost and Found at a Browning automatic rifle on the Edge of the World , “ a position to take drivel and corpses . ”

Sunny’swasthe neighborhood watering hole – literally ( for many years ) and figuratively . Owner Sunny Balzano earlier only opened Friday nights to give neighbor a place to cling out – but the energy he brought to the community , as well as the artsy communal vibe , are what brought a lot of newbie to Red Hook , and ultimately what made some of them remain , like Bait & Tackle ’s O’Meara , who first fare in 1995 .

Back then , though , things were different .

Hometwon Bar B Que

Cole Saladino/Thrillist

“ It was automobile on fire every night , for insurance , ” call up Tone Johansen of her arrival in Red Hook on a cold winter ’s day in January 1996 . Johansen quickly met Balzano , who helped inaugurate her to the neighborhood , shortly after her arrival . She had make out to New York from her aboriginal Norway on a P.S. 1 art President Grant and require to find a chintzy room . At the meter , a lot of artists had started dribble in after being price out of neighborhoods like SoHo and Williamsburg . She ultimately married Balzano , serve him run Sunny ’s – which is currently open six solar day a week – and now own it since his death earlier this year .

When The Good Fork ’s Kim was still cooking in Manhattan restaurant , she commuted to work by taking the B61 bus to the string station at Smith and Ninth Streets . Back then , there was a synthetic heroin clinic a couple blocks away , and wild dogs would tramp the streets . Today the dog and the clinic are both gone , as are the auto conflagration , and the neighborhood is now a hodgepodge of dilapidated buildings and vinyl - sided rowhouses . At the same time , reconstruct townhomes are now selling for upwards of $ 2 million . A mass of the longtime renter are now on the cusp of being priced out of the neighborhood , which Johansen describes as a “ piece of country in the city . ”

AECOM ’s program would surely continue that . The document recommend 45 million square feet of redevelopment in the area , feature a mushroom cloud - like proliferation of 45,000 new housing units , a quarter of which will be the so - call up affordable kind . The framework further call for three unexampled stay on a underground contrast extending from the 1 railroad train at Rector St and under the bay through Red Hook to connect with the existing Smith - Ninth Station .

Red Hook

AECOM Renderings|AECOM

sit outside in Sunny ’s back terrace with a loving cup of Lipton tea on a recent Sunday afternoon , Johansen , who is now in a court battle with family member who desire to trade the building that houses gay ’s , reacts to the AECOM rendition . “ I understand people are quick to capitalize on Red Hook now , ” she says . But that does n’t think of she ’s well-chosen about it . “ We need this as much as we want the measles . Development like that is just like a disease . ”

“ citizenry talking about skyscraper and wagon train , it ’s like add up into a little pool and throwing down a tsunami . ”

“ The [ correct ] operation , ” say Jill Eisenhard , executive director of the Red Hook Initiative , which focuses on youth development , “ would be engaging resident to ask , ‘ What are the motive you see ? ’ What does a community on the waterfront in geographical zone A , like Red Hook , where there ’s so much law of proximity to Brooklyn ’s largest public caparison project , what are the indigence and what are the challenges ? And take that and then develop a program . Without speak to a undivided community penis is shameful planning . ”

Eisenhard remark that there ’s no public eminent school in Red Hook ( there is a charter high school as well as public K-5 ) . The RHI has 75 teenager who attend 40 unlike public high schools , from Coney Island to the Bronx , some traveling an hour and a half each mode . The AECOM document does n’t make any specific recommendations for a public gamy schoolhouse .

AECOM responded via email : “ The fabric provides a prick for the residential area and relevant stakeholders to decide how they may want to approach future development opportunities … ( and ) is just the start of the conversation amongst city officials , occupant and other fundamental stakeholders . ”

Still , not everyone in Red Hook is so opposed to the approximation .

“ We ’re just a lilliputian torn , ” said The Good Fork ’s Kim . “ I desire it quieter , but from a business standpoint ? The more the jocund . Is it a in effect thing or bad thing that there are no more swan packs of domestic dog ? Am I beaming there ’s no more crock up that ’s being portion out on my street ? Yes , I am . But I also belong to a certain group of hoi polloi that lean to glamourise the guts . ”

To learn Hometown ’s Durney tell it , the impact could really go one of two ways . “ If you told me those skyscraper would make those ( minuscule ) businesses prosper , I ’m for it , ” he tell . “ If they ’re going to price them out , we ’re going to do our best to make that not come about . ”

Durney believes his business enterprise , which averages between 4,000 and 5,000 customers a week , would n’t be negatively affected by development of that caliber . Durney is also plan to open a 35- to 40 - rump fried chicken restaurant on Van Brunt in the next few month .

Truth be told , most neighborhood businesses could probably use an uptick in foot traffic , especially during the winter months . On a summer weekend day , Brooklyn Crabwill serve as many as 2200 client , while The Good Fork can stumble 125 on a Saturday . But as the days get shorter , business drops .

“ When it is stale , people do n’t come down to Red Hook . It ’s a real Coney Island effect , ” say Kim , who bet maybe 20 diners on a distinctive weekday night during wintertime .

While some neighbour are leaving for more low-cost component part of town like Ditmas Park – “ because who can give these crazy rents ? ” – Kim and Schneider , who own their star sign , are sticking it out , of late signing another 10 - twelvemonth lease on The Good Fork .

On the other script , too much evolution could seriously compromise the region ’s existing charms . Brian Davis , who opened the men ’s vintage store Wooden Sleepers two years ago , talks about the uniqueness of Van Brunt St , Red Hook ’s main retarding force .

Davis had always wanted to be part of a little business residential district that bear out each other – a piazza that reminded him of the seaboard town he ’d develop up in , in the North Fork of Long Island . When he come to Red Hook in the dead of winter , in January 2014 , he somehow knew he ’d found what he was look for .

“ It was dingy and freeze frigid , ” said Davis . But as he ram up towards the waterfront at the top of Van Brunt , first pass by the bars like theIce Houseand Bait & Tackle on the right , the longtime Kentler art veranda on the leftfield , as well as the warm luminosity of Fort Defiance and The Good Fork , he could also see ships and reek the saltiness urine . “ It felt like home , coastal , like Main Street , ” he said . “ People say hello to you on the street . ”

Davis also compares it to similar retail strips in Brooklyn , like Franklin Ave in Greenpoint and Smith St in Carroll Gardens . “ They all have a gunpoint of view , ” he said . “ The stores were interesting . multitude visited from all over the world . If you go to SoHo , it ’s like a high - end shopping centre anywhere in the macrocosm . Who the hell wants that ? ”

Valerie Feingold , who moved to the neighborhood in 2011 , really would n’t mind it . “ I did n’t think , ' How unworthy , ” said Feingold , oecumenical managing director at the immensely popular , tri - level Brooklyn Crab on Reed St , just around the street corner from Van Brunt . During peak summer season , the restaurant cover about 2,200 guests on a typical Saturday . “ I thought , ‘ How cool . ’ We ’d be getting a subway system out of it , and that would be huge . For me , the more people who can fare , the better it will be for line .

“ You get both : people who guess alteration and the influx of gentrification is live on to ruin the good luck charm of Red Hook . Everyone has nostalgia . remember their New York from their heyday . And your memory people of colour what you want out of the neighborhood . Look at Woody Allen moving picture , especially former films , he ’s always grumpy . It ’s always , ‘ There go the neighborhood . ’ ”

“ We do n’t have a lot of bankers here … until they can figure out how to get multitude to Downtown . ”

But this is n’t the first time Red Hook ’s been target for some over - the - top developing , and skeptics are enounce this a la mode existent - estate fantasy is just that – a pipe ambition .

St. John Frizell , who ’s lived in Red Hook since 2001 and opened his all - day coffeehouse Fort Defiance in 2009 , thinks the AECOM release is a packaging stunt . “ I recollect there ’s zero percent chance of it happening , ” he says . “ These projects typically do n’t work out . It ’s not going to pass off in my lifetime . ” Frizell also says the gentrification has n’t been as intense as it has in other neighborhoods like Williamsburg : “ mass who work here typically do n’t work in the city . Filmmakers , vivid decorator . We do n’t have a tidy sum of banker here … until they can figure out how to get people to Downtown . ”

In an emailed response , AECOM said , “ Extending the subway to Red Hook is a workable selection based on a sure level of development that would fund it . This is similar to what was done successfully with the recent 7 - occupation extension . ” It also stated that there is no time material body as of yet .

Even if the engineers ' grand imaginativeness for wholesale change never arrive to realization , Red Hook seems intend for young development .   Last year , LA developer Estate Four announced a five - class plan for its upcoming 12 - acre , mixed - consumption Red Hook Innovation District , while Thor Equities give up off waterfront construction for Red Hoek Point , a 7.7 - acre , tri - level office campus earlier this month .

For the Bait & Tackle , the clock is mark . O’Meara does n’t previse his landlord renewing his lease at an low-cost rate .

“ We miss something like the Bait & Tackle , it ’s like taking part of your affection , ” says Durney .

O’Meara is more resigned : “ It ’s New York City – everything changes . ”

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