It's Wednesday, you deserve a treat, like an episode of the Hell Gate Podcast! Listen here or watch here.
The north side of Delancey and Essex Streets is legendary for its gritty, old-school milieu. There is, of course, the Delancey Street McDonald's, which is legendary for transforming into a beloved and feared vortex of hell after midnight on any given weekend. Across Essex to the east sits the old Essex Street Market, a squat building from 1940 with a history as an open-air market that dates back to the 1880s. And there is the market's neighbor, a now-closed pizza dive formerly known as New Roma, which for decades served mediocre slices to famished drunks on their way to the train. Delancey-Essex is a relic of Old New York, currently still gritty and graffiti'd and home to street vendors selling thrifted clothing and home items for very good prices.
But the eastern side of the street is about to undergo a big change. BFC Partners, which has already helped transform the south side of Delancey and Essex into a set of glass-bound tower that resembles the Williamsburg waterfront, has revealed its plans to remake the former Essex Street Market site into a 10-story, mixed-use development. In July, the developers presented S9Architecture's renderings in a virtual meeting of Manhattan's Community Board 3, showing plans that include the installation of three new desperately-needed elevators and a new escalator for the entrance of the Delancey-Essex subway station.