The East 86th Street corridor is in a shameful condition and doesn\u2019t look like it\u2019s getting any better. On the retail front, the last thing we need is another grocery store.<\/p>\n
But recently Happier Grocery, a high end supermarket, inked a lease to take over the 21,000 sq. ft space that formerly housed City Cinemas at 210 E. 86th St. We don\u2019t need it.<\/p>\n
The East 86th Street corridor remains a mishmash of stores – some open for business, some languishing and waiting for a landlord to lock in a well-paying lease. It has perennial scaffolding, overflowing trash cans, delivery bikes parked everywhere, crime, and homelessness. Not promising. No more ethnic restaurants. No more theaters. No more culture. Barely a sit-down restaurant. And the corridor and its surrounding streets and avenues aren\u2019t much better. It\u2019s getting to be all about groceries.<\/p>\n
The area already has a well stocked Target at 150 East 86th St. and there is a Whole Foods a block off of East 86th Street at 1551 Third Ave.<\/p>\n
Happier Grocery is definitely not what\u2019s needed nor does it do anything to enhance 86th Street or the community. Here\u2019s the grocery lineup. Starting on the south side of Lexington Avenue and East 86th is Lexington Marketplace. Going east, mid-block between Lexington and 3rd Avenue is Target. Between 3rd Avenue and 2nd Avenue is Fairway. Between 1st Avenue and 2nd Avenue is a grocery\/bodega. On 84th Street and Lexington there\u2019s s D\u2019Agostino\u2019s. On 89th Street and Lexington is a Gristedes. Both are on the east side of Lexington. On the west side, between 88th and 89th Streets is a small grocery that\u2019s alongside a larger market with a street side fruit stand.<\/p>\n
On the corner of 2nd Avenue and 86th Street there\u2019s Lexington Marketplace. On East 85th Street and 2nd Avenue on the west side of the street, is another Marketplace. Truth to tell, there are Marketplaces all over the place and beyond the 86th Street area. They all look alike, whether big or small, and look like they have the same ownership from the layout and the stock.<\/p>\n
It won\u2019t change so long as landlords are the final arbiters of what\u2019s happening on East 86th Street. We once had the East Manhattan Chamber of Commerce. They had offices at 157 East 86th in the heart of the corridor. No more. And it won\u2019t get better until elected officials and a cohesive community band together, as they did on the West Side where local pressure helped bring about the reopening of Metro Cinema at West 100th Street and Broadway and local officials are trying to do in Midtown East to try to save the AMC theater in Kips Bay. That\u2019s the only way to get change that serves the community and the economy.<\/p>\n
I could go on about East 86th Street and its environs. And I will in future columns.<\/p>\n
East Side Politics<\/p>\n
Candidates past and present were at the Lexington Democratic Club\u2019s first Fall meeting at All Souls on E. 79th and Lexington. All was kumbaya as some past political foes in the Democratic primaries only three months ago mingled cheerfully.<\/p>\n
Club president Howard Sanders announced the evening\u2019s schedule and was followed by former Lex Club president and candidate for 73rd Assembly District, Vanessa Aronson. She pitched the crowd to get out the vote by volunteering. She spoke about her upcoming election where she is running on the Democratic line with no Republican opponent on the ballot.<\/p>\n
Next on the agenda was CD 5 Council Member Virginia Maloney, who ran and won against Aronson in the Democratic primary last year but is a big supporter of Aronson as she vies to take over the seat incumbent Alex Bores is vacating.<\/p>\n
Maloney updated her work on proposed legislation and hearings, including e-bikes, public safety, antisemitism, technology and consumer protection. Another speaker was West Side Assembly Member Micah Lasher, who is running against Republican Caroline Shinkle in November for the seat being vacated by Jerry Nadler.<\/p>\n
And of course, Lasher was the victor over runnerup Alex Bores in a very crowded Democratic primary for Congress in June.<\/p>\n
Also on the November ballot on the UES is State Senator Liz Krueger. There was a joint Krueger\/Aronson palm card promising \u201cDelivering results for the East Side, together.\u201d Alina Bonsell is running against Krueger on the Republican line and also has a third party line the Block Mamdani party.<\/p>\n
On another note, at the end of the Lex Club meeting, there was a meeting of the divisional committee of the NY County Democratic Committee for the 73rd AD, Part B, conducted by Lex Club member and Temporary Chair Sue Moss. Among the order of business on the agenda was the election to fill the vacancy for District Leader for the 73rd AD, Part B. Reid Aronson was nominated by Vanessa Aronson, his wife. Having been seconded by a volunteer without other nominations, Moss declared that \u201cReid Aronson has been elected to fill the vacancy for District Leader for the 73rd A.D., part B.\u201d) Having been elected, he does not appear on the November ballot.<\/p>\n
Re-reading above, an interesting familial fact emerges in UES Democrat politics. CM Virginia Maloney\u2019s is former Congressmember Carolyn Maloney\u2019s daughter. AM Bores mom Lori is active politically. Newly elected District Leader Reid Aronson is Vanessa Aronson\u2019s spouse. Lasher\u2019s mom, Stephanie Lasher, is active in West Side Democrat politics. And the tradition goes back in time: Bobby Wagner, Jr., whose dad was Mayor Robert Wagner, was a Councilmember-at-Large and Deputy Mayor of Policy under Mayor Ed Koch.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The East 86th Street corridor is in a shameful condition and doesn\u2019t look like it\u2019s getting any better.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":358410,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[133483,9,11,10],"class_list":["post-358409","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-east-86th-street","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358409","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=358409"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358409\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/358410"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=358409"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=358409"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=358409"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}