Another Ridgewood Landmark District?

This map shows the boundaries of the proposed Central Ridgewood Historic District, which would institute landmark status to more than 900 homes in the area. (map courtesy of the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission) Having approved Ridgewood’s third landmark district two weeks ago, the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) now has its sights set on a fourth district that, if approved, would cover more homes than all other landmark areas in the neighborhood combined.

The Times Newsweekly has learned that the LPC has “calendared” a review of the proposed “Central Ridgewood Historic District,” an area of approximately 940 brick rowhouses built during the early 1900s in the heart of the community. An LPC spokesperson told this newspaper on Monday, Nov. 8, that the agency that a public hearing on the plan would be forthcoming, but no specific date for it has been set.

The commission voted at its Oct. 26 meeting to create the Ridgewood South Historic District, an area of 212 Mathews flats apartment houses located in an area generally bounded on the north by Woodbine Street, on the south by Catalpa Avenue, on the east by Woodward Avenue and on the west by Onderdonk Avenue. The City Council must vote to approve the district’s creation before it will be officially recognized by the city.

Previously, the LPC and City Council approved the Ridgewood North Historic District, which covers an area of 90 Mathews flats buildings in an area generally bounded by Forest and Fairview avenues between Gates Avenue and Woodbine Street. Several years ago, the LPC also instituted landmark status for a block of Stockholm Street between Woodward and Onderdonk avenues.

But the Central Ridgewood district, if enacted, would protect more than three times the total number of buildings in Ridgewood landmark districts. Most of the structures in the proposed district are brick rowhouses designed by the architectural firm Louis Berger and Company and developed by August Bauer and Paul Stier between the turn of the 20th century and the mid-1920s.

Carved out of an area of Ridgewood spanning about 40 blocks, the Central Ridgewood district is generally bounded by Madison Street on the north, 71st Avenue on the south, Fresh Pond Road on the east and Forest Avenue on the west. It also includes homes in an area bounded by Catalpa and 70th avenues between Forest and Onderdonk avenues.

Famous for their projecting curved bays, uninterrupted cornices and brown, red or amber brickfaces, the homes were among the more than 5,000 buildings designed by Berger, a German immigrant, which were built in Ridgewood and Bushwick between 1895 and 1930.

A graduate of Pratt Institute who studied architecture, Berger moved his office to Ridgewood in 1910 and joined the development firm jointly operated by Bauer and Stier. The two developers erected more than 2,000 residential buildings around the neighborhood at a time when the area became populated with immigrants from Germany.

Stier would go on to be elected as the sheriff of Queens County in 1915, but he would die one year later after being shot by a man he was attempting to evict from a Whitestone home. Stier Place, a short street located on Putnam Avenue one block west of Fresh Pond Road—near the Ridgewood Democratic Club, where his office once stood—is named in his honor.

Each of the two story homes feature brick detailing in the Renaissance Revival style along with metal cornices, brownstone stoops, wrought iron fencing and glass and wood door frames. The LPC noted that many of these features remain in tact for most homes within the proposed district.

“Representing a cohesive collection of speculative urban architecture, the row houses in the proposed Central Ridgewood Historic District retain extremely high levels of architectural integrity and represent an important part of the development of housing in New York City,” according to the LPC fact sheet.

More landmarking to come

Under landmark regulations, homeowners would be required to maintain the exterior of their properties. If they wish to make renovations to the windows, brickface, doors or fencing, they must seek and receive a permit from the LPC. Property owners who fail to comply with LPC regulations would be forewarned by the agency and given a grace period to correct the violations before fines could be levied.

City Council Member Diana Reyna, while formally announcing the passage of the Ridgewood South Historic District at last Thursday’s (Nov. 4) meeting of the Ridgewood Property Owners and Civic Association (RPOCA), indicated that the community would continue its pursuit of creating one large historic district in the neighborhood.

“You are a part of history. You should be proud of what each page in this document has,” she told residents while holding up the LPC’s report on the historic district. Reyna added that the passage of the latest district moved the neighborhood one step closer into having “one contiguous historic district.”

The legislator said that she would ask representatives of the LPC to attend RPOCA’s February meeting to provide residents with further information on what landmarking means for them.

Paul Kerzner, RPOCA counsel and incoming president, noted that the civic group is working to have all 2,982 buildings in Ridgewood listed on the National Register of Historic Places declared landmarks by the city’s LPC. Though the buildings received the federal historic designation nearly 30 years ago, he observed that the civic group did not pursue landmark status from the city at that point since the LPC’s standards were too constrictive for many property owners.

Those standards were eventually revised and scaled back to the point where landmarking became a viable option for Ridgewood, Kerzner added.

“This report brings us to about one-third of the properties” being sought for landmark designation in Ridgewood, he said. “We still have two-thirds to go.”

Kerzner pointed out that in Ridgewood and other areas of New York City where landmark districts have been created, “property values have continued to go up” even while real estate markets have soured elsewhere.

“It’s an insurance policy so Ridgewood’s housing stock will stay the way it was when it was first built by Gustave Mathews and Paul Stier,” he added.

Kerzner told the Times Newsweekly in a phone interview that he is happy that the LPC has the Central Ridgewood plan “on their radar screen.” He hopes that the agency will accomplish the civic group’s goal of having one landmark district for all 2,982 buildings on the national register by the conclusion of Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s third term.

“We’re approaching the half-way mark which is great,” he said. “What they’ve been doing is unfolding this in a nice way. As they approve one landmark district, they bring another one in from the dugout.”