Thor Equities LLC

The jukebox at Ruby’s Bar & Grill was cranking out its usual eclectic mix of beachy classics—Frank Sinatra’s “Strangers In the Night,” Milli Vanilli’s “Blame It on the Rain”—this past Saturday when proprietor Michael Sarrel abruptly pulled the plug.

“Finish your drinks!” he told patrons of the venerable Coney Island venue at 5:22 p.m.  read more »

Thor Equities boss Joe Sitt just keeps caving to the carny lobby -- extending leases along the boardwalk, possibly preserving Astroland for another summer -- all the while his ambitious Coney Island renaissance scheme remains on the backburner.

Can't a developer catch a break?

This week's Brooklyn Paper keeps piling on, with more Sitt-ripping comments from Yale-educated freak-show operator Dick Zigun:

The so-called mayor of Coney Island, Dick Zigun, last week sent a formal denouncement of the developer to city decision-makers. In the letter, Zigun, the founder of the Coney Island Museum and the popular Mermaid Parade, called Sitt a “bully.”

Zigun has his own gripe with Sitt, accusing him of backing out of [a] deal to sell Zigun a historic Surf Avenue building for a new home for the Coney Island Museum.

“I am totally outraged,” Zigun said about his dealings with Sitt. “He told me and the city for a year and a half that he would work to preserve the character of Coney Island and save this building, and now he is not.”

What, Thor Equities not follow through on its stated goals? Somebody better inform the folks at Albee Square.

• This month's Metropolis cover-story is on The Piano Man: "This sense of transparency is part of the story," the architect says about his new NYT HQ. "It's about the art of telling the story by using form. And the idea [is] that the Times is a building and institution where the relationship with the city is more open, more permeable." Architecture cliches and media cliches go so well together! [Metropolis Magazine]
• Coney Island's Astrotower may be migrating "to an amusement park in the South." Or maybe the 275-foot-tall thrill-ride will be donated to Manhattan? Either way: acrophobes, beware. [NY Post]
• The impending of demolition of Red Hook's iconic Revere Sugar Refinery is being captured in real time on the newfangled Internets. The RSR owner, Thor Equities, will have some explaining to do. [Curbed]
• The sellers of Starrett City--the 140-acre Brooklyn sprawl--promise that the community's 14,000 residents won't be robbed of their housing subsidies after the impending big-buck sale. And the buyers won't raze the whole place either! "They'd have to evict tenants from 5,800 units, and that would take 58 years and cost them $500 million in legal fees." Doesn't sound that far-fetched. [Multi-Housing News]
- Max Abelson
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Call us curmudgeons, but we never really liked it anyway. Too damn hot and trash-strewn in the summer; and winters, with the stiff cold air off of the Atlantic and the desolation, made it feel like we were lost in the Kessel off the Volga waiting for Stalin's minions to come and finish us off (there are Russians there, right? ... so the comparison, no matter how tortuous, holds).

But it least it ain't Atlantic Yards ... right? Right?
Blooger Gowanus Lounge has the goods on Thor Equities barfalicious plan to destroy another little bit of New York culture.
Sayeth Gowanus:

A lot of words come to mind to describe all of this and, unfortunately, none of them are good. Instead of offering an exicting vision worthy of Coney Island's storied past, this glimpse of the plans reveals a pedestrian, cookie-cutter kind of future that springs from an idea of what faux funky resorts are supposed to be. It offers offers little more than window dressing to disguise what is otherwise a shopping mall with some highrises. Steeplechase or Luna Park, it ain't.

And remember: Thor Equities is the same firm that bought the old Sugar Factory in Red Hook adjacent to the Ikea site. At the rate they're going, Vineger Hill's next!  read more »

-Matthew Grace

We just got word that the Revere sugar factory, which sits in between the Ikea site and the just-open-already! Fairway grocery store in Red Hook, barely dodged the Industrial Business Zone bullet today. Thor Equities, which bought the site last year for $40 million, wants to develop the property into residential and commercial buildings. But standing in its way was the likely I.B.Z. designation that the area was due to receive. Update: We've got the final Southwest Brooklyn I.B.Z. map after the jump.  read more »

The Brooklyn Papers report that Community Board 6's waterfront committee smacked down Thor Equities plea to have its Revere Sugar refinery, on the waterfront in Red Hook, exempted from the Industrial Business Zone. The refinery has sat abandoned for years.

The developer recently bought the property for $40 million and is trying to convert the site into retail and residential properties. It's located next to Greg O'Connell's Beard Street Pier and two blocks form the soon-to-open Fairway grocery store.  read more »

The I.B.Z. is designed to retain industry in the city, making it harder for developers to rezone industrial property.

-Matthew Grace