May 5, 2019 Your Neighborhood — Your News®
LOCAL
CL ASSIFIEDS
PA GE 19
Construction fi nally starts at Lowe’s site
Developments begin at Douglaston Plaza after months of uncertainty about big box store
Crackdown on
spot savers in
Maspeth area
A HOPPING GOOD TIME
Children enjoyed a day of springtime fun — including potato sack races, inflatable rides and even a late
Easter egg hunt — at the Juniper Valley Park Easter/Spring Festival in Middle Village on April 27.
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AOC defends Amazon HQ2
Three men sought
for violent slashing
Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-
Cortez talks issues both local and
national at a Corona town hall.
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l1i8cation UPDATED EVERY DAY AT TIMESLEDGER.COM
BY JENNA BAGCAL
Douglaston and Little Neck
residents have been in the dark
about the development of the
Lowe’s Home Improvement at the
Douglaston Plaza shopping center
ever since Community Board 11
approved it in February 2018.
But Department of Buildings
(DOB) records from March
indicate that work continues
at the shopping center at
262-02 61st Ave.
According to the DOB website,
the city approved applications for
alterations, HVAC and plumbing
work at Douglaston Plaza for
the first time since August 2018.
Construction workers were
present at the site when QNS
visited on April 30.
Perry M. Petrillo Architects
and Herrick-Saylor Engineers,
who are both working on
the project, have had prior
experience building Lowe’s
Home Improvement Stores across
the country.
But a Lowe’s spokesperson
said that “we don’t have any
announcements to share” when
asked about the status of the
store’s arrival. Ashkenazy
Acquisition Corp. (AAC), which
owns Douglaston Plaza, failed to
respond to multiple phone calls
and emails for comment.
While the status of the Lowe’s
and other storefronts remains
unknown, QNS discovered that
AAC hired Ripco Real Estate to
lease 110,000 square feet of the
property. When asked how the
leasing would affect Lowe’s, Ripco
leasing agent Doug Weinstein
said he was “not at liberty to say”
whether or not Lowe’s was still
coming to the shopping center.
“The community will have an
idea of what’s going to happen in
the near future,” Weinstein told
QNS. He added that businesses
have shown “lots of interest” in
leasing at the plaza.
Fairway Market, T-Mobile
and Burger King are the current
tenants at the shopping center.
In March, The Real
UPDATED EVERY DAY AT QNS.BY MARK HALLUM
Homeowners using cones and
garbage cans to reserve parking
on the streets of the 104th Precinct
got a rude awakening from NYPD
as the command completed a
sweep of Maspeth.
The 104th Precinct went on
an initial crusade against utility
cones used on the street to save
parking spots in December when
they scanned the Liberty Park
area of Glendale.
“NCO Charlie (#Maspeth) and
@NYCSanitation cracking down
on residents complaint with
homeowners using waste bins and
cones to reserve parking space.
Violators were issued summonses
with the help of sanitation,” the
precinct tweeted out on April 26.
In their initial crackdown,
authorities pointed out that not
only is it illegal to claim a public
spot for oneself, it can cause
frustration with neighbors and
even be considered theft if the
cones are taken from a nearby
construction site.
Councilman Robert Holden
BY EMILY DAVENPORT
Cops are looking for a trio who slashed two
teenagers on a Briarwood street last week.
Police say that at 12:55 p.m. on April 25, two
18-year-old men were walking in the vicinity of
BY MARK HALLUM
During her first
town hall event in
Queens, Congresswoman
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
took questions about
local and national issues
from constituents for up
to two hours.
But one of the most
controversial topics in
recent memory for New
Yorkers was the loss of
25,000 to 40,000 projected
jobs from the establishment
of Amazon HQ2 in Long
Island City — a deal that
many supporters blamed
politicians such as Ocasio-
Cortez for allowing to
fall apart.
The freshman
representative was just one
of the three most outspoken
opponents who cast a
Continued on Page 18 Photo: Mark Hallum/QNS
Continued on Page 18
Photo by Dean Moses
/TIMESLEDGER.COM
