“We all know what happens when the designer stores come in,” said Gloria Sukenick, a member of the Metropolitan Council on Housing and a 16-year Chelsea resident.

“You have to take two buses to buy a light bulb or a screwdriver…The people (in public housing) won’t have any place to shop anymore.”

Ms. Sukenick and other neighborhood activists are organizing a rally on May 3 to “Save the Mom-and-Pop stores of 9th Avenue.”

At least eight stores along this “last ungentrified block in Chelsea” could displaced within the next two years as their leases expire, she said.  read more »

Fortuna Realty Group, headed up by Morris Moinian, has paid $31.4 million for a pre-war rental building at 112 Ninth Avenue, at the border of the meatpacking district and Chelsea, city records show.

Recognize the name? Morris, who tends to stick to building hotels, is the brother of the development mogul Joseph Moinian, CEO of the Moinian Group.  read more »