![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Bainbridge-fire-123.jpg\")
<\/a>THE REMAINS OF seven small businesses FIRE TRUCKS ARE seen on Bainbridge Avenue and East 206th Street in Norwood, The Bronx on Oct. 17, 2023, a week after as fire officials continued carrying out their investigation into a commercial fire which ripped through seven small businesses on the avenue further down the block one week earlier on Oct. 10, 2023.Photo by S\u00edle Moloney<\/p>\n
Ever since arson was\u00a0confirmed<\/a> by the NYPD as the cause of the devastating, 4-alarm, nonfatal, commercial fire<\/a> that ripped through seven one-story, small businesses at 3109-3123 Bainbridge Avenue in Norwood in October 2023, residents had long been waiting to find out what would become of the demolished and long abandoned site that has long been seen as an eyesore<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The site, located south of East 206th Street, and northwest of both East 205th and East 204th Streets, was sold earlier this year to Foodtown LLC in Mount Vernon, according to the latest NYC Department of Finance records, as had been rumored<\/a>. Despite relentlessly trying to seek information on the future plans for the Bainbridge Avenue 2023 fire site from the prevailing property owner, Brooklyn-based, Bainbridge Realty Associates, Norwood News had been stonewalled<\/a>, as reported.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Meanwhile, the monetary value of the latest purchase was not disclosed in the Memorandum of Contract. According to information published on real estate site, HuntRealEstate.com<\/a>, the lot is estimated to be worth $238,500 as of 2026.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n At the last Bronx Community Board 7 (CB7) general board meeting before the summer hiatus held June 30 at the New York Botanical Garden, Noah Katz of Foodtown LLC shared with the community that the plan for the site is to build a new multi-story, multi-purpose building comprising residential apartments on the upper floors and some (as yet unknown) commercial business(s) at street level.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019d like to put apartments above,\u201d Katz said in part to those gathered. \u201cWe want to make it beautiful. We want to get it going, but we\u2019re going to ask you for a zoning change because it\u2019s strange. There\u2019s only a commercial one floor on that street. We\u2019d like to build something even more beautiful with homes and everything, and we\u2019re going to be making that request again officially with everyone involved.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n He added in part, \u201cIt\u2019s basically the block that CVS is on, and everything around it is apartment buildings. If you look from an aerial view, Google Earth, it\u2019s the only strip that\u2019s one floor in the district, in that area. So, that\u2019s what we like to do.\u201d<\/p>\n Katz continued in part, \u201cThis is the first of many meetings with your input, your involvement. We want to hear from you. I mean that and what we\u2019d like to do\u2026.it\u2019s a weird situation. What we encounter is that the whole block is only zoned for commercial. So, what we\u2019re going to request is apartment buildings above. We\u2019d like to build residences so people have homes, two bedrooms, one bedroom. We\u2019re gonna work all that out. We\u2019re gonna get the professionals involved. I\u2019m just a lowly retailer but we want to get behind it and get this done. This is the first of many meetings. We\u2019ll make presentations before the [CB7] land use committee.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n In addition to some less severe damage to CVS Pharmacy, which closed temporarily after the fire and later reopened, other businesses along the block destroyed and demolished in the October 2023 fire included, as reported<\/a>, the Family Meat Market business, Bainbridge Bakery, Halal Curry & Kebab restaurant, a fish market, Shahjalal Grocery & Variety, which sells Bangladeshi, American, Indian & Pakistani food, and a Mexican grocery store.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n As reported<\/a>, that October 2023 fire, located on a 8,000 SF site, is the fourth major commercial fire to have hit the area since early 2009, and at least the second linked to arson.<\/p>\n In 2009, Norwood News\u00a0reported<\/a> on the Bainbridge Bakery<\/a> commercial fire that took place in the vicinity of 3083 Bainbridge Avenue, at the corner of Bainbridge Avenue and East 204th Street, now the site of Laundry Mart, on Halloween in October that year. That fire also affected around ten other small businesses. We reported on its aftermath,<\/a>\u00a0a legal battle which\u00a0ensued<\/a>, and the subsequent\u00a0redevelopment<\/a>\u00a0of the\u00a0affected site<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The site in question was purchased by the Katz family, owners of Foodtown LLC, and was later redeveloped. It was the second fire to have impacted the same Bainbridge Bakery<\/a>, following an earlier April 2009 fire<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Two months after the Halloween October 2009 fire, in December 2009, another commercial fire<\/a> on nearby East 204th Street ripped through the same general commercial strip, diagonally across from the October 2009 fire site, once again affecting a number of local businesses, including Foodtown.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n As reported<\/a>, the December 2009, 5-alarm blaze, at 283 East 204th Street, gutted Foodtown, the only supermarket on the strip, which had been renovated only six months prior to the fire. The same December 2009 fire also gutted an American Diner and a dental office. McKeon Funeral Home and a local bank also incurred some less severe damage. The affected businesses were located at the current site of the now, renovated and expanded Foodtown store.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n After the Bronx CB7 board meeting on June 30, Katz explained to Norwood News that the same East 204th Street Foodtown branch, located between East 205th Street and Perry Avenue, a short distance from the site of the 2023 Bainbridge Avenue fire, is now cooperatively owned.<\/p>\n According to at least one media report at the time, prosecutors later said a 52-year-old man was arrested and charged with arson for his alleged involvement with that December 2009 fire. It was reported that the man allegedly hired another 53-year-old man to start the blaze, because the former had allegedly been in debt and had allegedly bought a half-million dollar insurance policy on the diner before the fire occurred.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n It was reported that the 53-year-old man was also arrested. Norwood News reached out to the Bronx District Attorney\u2019s office for details of the final outcome of both legal cases and were advised that the 52-year-old\u2019s 2010 case is sealed, and that there is no record in the DA\u2019s database for the second 53-year-old man.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Separately, Norwood News also asked the FDNY for the cause of the April 2009<\/a> fire, the October 2009<\/a>\u00a0fire, the December 2009<\/a> fire, and the Fire Marshal\u2019s report for the October 2023 fire<\/a>, for which we sent a Freedom of Information Request or FOIL. After several reminders and an acknowledgement of receipt, Norwood News was scheduled to receive a response to the FOIL request in April 2026, but has not yet received it. We will continue to follow up and update this story upon receipt of any feedback to all of our inquiries.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Back at the June Bronx CB7 meeting, Katz made reference to the prior fire at Foodtown in December 2009, saying in part, \u201cWhen, for example, the store [Foodtown] burned down Christmas week in 2008 [2009], I stood up on a milk crate at McDonalds and I said to the community, \u2018We\u2019re going to rebuild this store, and we got it done in less than a year.’\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Katz said \u201cevery single person\u201d working at the Foodtown branch that burned down in December 2009 was re-employed at one of the other Foodtowns. \u201cNobody lost their job,\u201d he said. \u201cEverybody works everywhere today and we got the whole thing rebuilt.\u201d<\/p>\n Seemingly in reference to the October 2009 Bainbridge Bakery fire, Katz continued, \u201cThen, you can\u2019t make this up! A few years later, the store diagonally across the street, all the stores burned down. It\u2019s crazy! When you have a fire in a community, it\u2019s very bad for the community, and my brother (Dan) and I, the very nice lady who opened that building back in [inaudible] didn\u2019t necessarily have the capacity to rebuild it. We took it on. We got it rebuilt.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n [As above, the Bainbridge Bakery fire took place in October 2009 and was replaced by Laundry Mart, and the Foodtown fire took place later in December 2009. Norwood News attempted to reach Katz for clarification but we were unsuccessful.] Katz continued, \u201cThere\u2019s a laundromat, there\u2019s an eyeglass store, there\u2019s a little pharmacy there. We are here for the community. I mean that.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Then, seemingly in reference to the latest October 2023 fire, Katz said in part, \u201cSo now, two years ago, on the same street next to CVS, another fire. I\u2019m here today to let you know. We have a building on that block, a couple of buildings. A gentleman who has that building, I know him very, very well. He\u2019s a wonderful gentleman. We are going to rebuild, and that\u2019s what I want to tell you.\u201d Katz then offered to answer any questions. There were none.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n As reported<\/a>, after the 2023 Bainbridge Avenue fire, Katz and Foodtown arranged to send workers to the Bainbridge Avenue fire site to help clean up the area and offer other assistance.<\/p>\n In light of the news, this week, as part of our Inquiring Photographer series, Norwood News asked readers for their opinion on the proposed multi-story building on the empty Bainbridge Avenue lot. Read more here.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Click here<\/a>, here<\/a>, here<\/a>,\u00a0here<\/a>,\u00a0here<\/a>, here<\/a>, here<\/a> and here<\/a> to read our previous coverage of that latest October 2023 fire.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By S\u00cdLE MOLONEY THE REMAINS OF seven small businesses FIRE TRUCKS ARE seen on Bainbridge Avenue and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":305319,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[128,9,24,63,129,131,130],"class_list":["post-305318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bronx","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=305318"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/305318\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/305319"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=305318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=305318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=305318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a>THE EMPTY LOT at 3109-3123 Bainbridge Avenue, located south of East 206th Street and northwest of East 205th and East 204th Streets in Norwood, where a 4-alarm commercial fire destroyed several small businesses in October 2023, is seen in July 2026.\u00a0 \u00a0
Photo by S\u00edle Moloney<\/p>\n<\/a>FIREFIGHTERS RESPOND TO a 4-alarm fire on Bainbridge Avenue in the Norwood section of The Bronx in the early hours of Tuesday, Oct. 10, 2023.
Photo by S\u00edle Moloney<\/p>\n<\/a>NOAH KATZ OF Foodtown LLC addresses those gathered at the Bronx Community Board 7 general boarding held at the New York Botanical Garden on June 30, 2026, the last general board meeting before the summer hiatus.\u00a0
Photo by S\u00edle Moloney<\/p>\n<\/a>NOAH KATZ OF Foodtown LLC addresses those gathered at the Bronx Community Board 7 general boarding held at the New York Botanical Garden on June 30, 2026, the last general board meeting before the summer hiatus.\u00a0
Photo by S\u00edle Moloney<\/p>\n<\/a>A FOODTOWN BRANCH, reportedly now cooperatively owned, is located on East 204th Street, between East 205th Street and Perry Avenue in Norwood. The supermarket chain has purchased another nearby Bainbridge Avenue site, located between East 206th Street and East 205th Street, where an October 2023 commercial fire destroyed several small businesses on the strip.
Image courtesy of Google Maps<\/p>\n