Brownfield housing still causing problems

From the Queens Chronicle:

A housing and hotel complex project off the Long Island Expressway in Fresh Meadows has neighbors fuming over lack of maintenance, shoddy workmanship and fear of future flooding.

The project’s address is 183-15 Horace Harding Expressway, but the 18 two-family houses that were completed over a year ago are located on adjacent 183rd Street and Booth Memorial Drive, residential streets with well-maintained homes.

Neighbors complain that there is no maintenance of the site, which features a large hole in the middle where the hotels are to be constructed. It was dug so that the project could be grandfathered in prior to a downzoning of the area.

Nearby residents say the hole attracts raccoons and other animals, while nearby barrels are filled with rainwater that they fear are breeding grounds for mosquitoes. The construction fences on the Horace Harding and Booth Memorial sides are flimsy and the one in the rear can be easily moved. Vandals have already stolen decorative metal balls atop railings on the houses.

Christine Haider, first vice chairwoman of Community Board 11 and president of the nearby Harding Heights Civic Association, says she’s “extremely concerned” about how the development is being built. “There are so many problems, it’s very frustrating,” Haider said. “The developer can amend plans until construction is finished.”

The most troublesome issue to neighbors is the driveways, which were designed too steep for the underground garages. The Department of Buildings did not approve it so the owners, Century Construction Group Corp., headed by brothers Chris and George Xu, raised the grade of the driveways, which eliminated the garages.

“They repitched it, eliminating the garage, so there’s no room for two cars as planned,” Haider said. “We fear that they will try to put a third family in the basement since they added a window where the garage door was to go.”

Oh come now, when have you ever heard of a developer doing that?...

It seems like just yesterday that this was a brownfield.