Beat the Downzone: Grand Street Olympics Edition

On Tuesday, we ran an item about weekend work that developers hoping to build a 14-story Karl Fischer building at Grand and Driggs have been doing. Presumably, they are working to get out in front of a downzoning that would allow a four-story building on the site. If a foundation is complete before the downzone, the taller building can go up. In most neighborhood, such situations have led to significant amounts of after-hours and weekend work as well as charges of forged documents and other practices to try to get projects approved. In any case, photos of work that took place on Sunday were forwarded to us yesterday and are above. (The photo below is from a different day and is included as some demolition porn.) Here is bit of the email that came with them:

These are photos taken by a number of people on with different views of the construction site. They show the dust, a wrong way truck on the street, work on Sunday before 9am and lack of hardhats for workers...

All indications are that it will be a long few months on Grand Street. Residents are working to try to speed the approval process on the downzoning, but they're also hoping for honest enforcement (or just-plain enforcement) of building rules. We look forward to an array of photos and videos from residents documenting any illegal or unsafe work. As always, readers are invited to send photos and information about this or any other development site to thegowanuslounge (at) gmail (dot) com.