West Village Pedestrian Plaza: Urban Oasis Or Drunken After-Hours Party Hole?

In the late '80s, the little triangle created by Jane Street, Eighth Avenue and West Fourth Street turned into an impromptu AIDS memorial. Later, the DOT added a tree and created a pedestrian island with granite slabs, and bike racks. But West Village preservationists were aghast at these modern abominations, and the DOT soon backpedaled, removing the infernal bike racks and replacing the granite slabs with planters. Yet now the war over the Jane Street triangle has been reignited, as the DOT wants to shove the bike racks and the seating slabs back down the neighborhood's throats! The Villager reports that the locals are not opening wide, for they fear the changes will bring drunken revelers when the bars close at 4 a.m.

"We live one floor off the sidewalk…directly above the triangle,” the parents of two small children wrote to the local community board. “Literally our bedroom windows look out onto it, just a few feet away! The thought of our kids (as well as ourselves) being regularly woken up by drunken fun-seekers is enough to make us cringe! Please don’t put any seating in the new triangle!” Another local resident says, "Nobody’s going to want to sit on these granite benches unless they’re drunk, it’s early in the morning, and they’re smoking cigarettes. It’s a good plan — except the benches."

Indeed, the plan was approved by Community Board 2's Traffic and Transportation Committee. But then C.B. 2’s Landmarks and Public Aesthetics Committee passed their own resolution, approving the plan on the condition that the DOT take out the benches. But then! But then! The Villager reports that a later meeting in April, C.B. 2 voted to make that resolution null and void. Of course, that's not the end of it, either. The Chairperson of the Landmarks and Public Aesthetics Committee says the issue of the benches is "still up in the air. There may be a protest there by the people who don’t want those benches there."

We're waiting to hear back from the DOT on this vital issue that is tearing the West Village apart, but at this point it looks like Anna Wintour's going to have to step in to settle this before someone starts a conversation outside late at night.