In 2011, St. Mark's Bookshop was made the cause célèbre of East Village gentrification after its landlord threatened it with an untenable rent hike. Petitions were signed and rabble was roused, and the beloved bookseller fought hard against the relentless drumbeat of rising rents. The rents eventually won out, as they always do, though fortunately St. Mark's decamped to another location.

Fast forward to today, the better part of the way through 2015. The old St. Mark's has been vacant for more than a year. This isn't uncommon; often landlords find it more profitable to simply wait until a wealthy tenant—usually a national chain—can afford to pay whatever exorbitant rent they've decided the property is worth.

Still, as Jeremiah Moss put it today on his blog:

With the space vacant for over a year, landlord Cooper Union is contributing to the high-rent blight of the neighborhood, presumably while they wait for a Chipotle or Starbucks to take the spot. As I've said before, there ought to be a law.

Terry McCoy, one of St. Marks' co-founders, is resigned when it comes to his shop's still-empty former home. He's glad so many people care so deeply about keeping independent bookstores alive, but understands that the building's owner is prowling for a high-rent tenant. The book store has had several previous locations, he said, but "it always gives you an ache when you walk by any of them." For the most part, though, he's put it behind him.

In March, Moss launched #SaveNYC, an initiative comprised of five core proposals aimed at protecting small businesses, like restricting "formula retail," fining landlords who keep spaces vacant for too long, and regulating commercial lease renewals to prevent sky-high rent increases.

Joyce Ravitz, President of the Cooper Square Committee, said in her opinion, the onus should be not on landlords, but politicians, who have the power to regulate rents on business just as they do on apartments.

"What I guess that Cooper Union is finding out is that not only is St. Mark's not able to pay the astronomical rent they were asking, but nobody else wants to," she said. Rent regulations, she said, "will save New York."

Ravitz recently returned from five months abroad to find that even her doctor had to move, unable to find the funds to renew the office's lease. She said things have changed even in the half-year she'd been gone.

"Since I'm back I see beloved stores that aren't there anymore," she said. "It's like a ghost town."