Reach Out and Touch Someone at the End of Court Street

We're fascinated by new buildings that bump up against the Gowanus and the BQE. We understand the old ones that were there before Robert Moses cut a swath through Brooklyn and Queens. We might even get why developers build new buildings right up against it. What confuses us, though, is why people would shell out big bucks to buy a new condo in one or to rent a new apartment ten or fifteen yards from insane traffic and noxious fumes. In any case, one of these buildings has been going up at the end of Court Street at Garnet Street and Hamilton Avenue beside the Gowanus Expressway. A reader wrote us to say that the building had sprouted another two floors while she was away away on a trip:

When I peeked out my front window onto Court, I saw that a building they'd been working on for a few months had suddenly sprouted two floors. Most of the buildings here are ground floor plus two levels above. So you can imagine this thing towers above them all, but ironically whoever might eventually live in those two 'extra' floors could almost reach out and shake hands with the motorists on the Gowanus Expressway. Anyway, the building's on a really busy intersection and it would be hell to live there. The noise of the trucks can be bad enough at times and I'm a bit back from the whole thing... Now that's a real estate selling job, can't wait to read the description of those apts.

Of the end of Court down by Hamilton Avenue and the Gowanus she adds:

On 9th between Court and Hamilton Ave there's a newly built condo block. Weirdly, when I moved in about a year and a half ago the agent said 'oh there's this great building across the way, about to open up which will mean better stores, bars down this end of Court. Lovely, sez I, bring on a good grocers down this end of the street but nothing has happened since and the block looks like it was never inhabited since completion. The whole thing's now for sale. So in some ways, the quiet end of Court hasn't really taken off as predicted by other agents I heard say similar things a fair while back. Not really complaining as I kinda like our quiet thing.

A couple of more pics below.