The Modern Gets Back to Rocking the Burg on Weekends

We got a call from a neighbor of The Modern, the controversial development on N. 7th Street in Williamsburg that work crews were busy working yesterday when they shouldn't have been. (The photo at right was taken in mid-afternoon.) The building has caused much unhappiness in the hood due to some of the damage it has caused to neighboring properties and the tendency of work to happen on weekends and even late at night. There were two complaints phoned in yesterday about the building at 205 N. 7 Street, which was designed by Robert Scarano, and has been the subject of multiple Stop Work Orders. The call we got indicated that 311 was refusing to take further complaints about the weekend work because one complaint had already been noted. (We wonder, though, if multiple complaints would provide a public record about how many residents are having issues with a particular building in the event of a lack of response by the Department of Buildings or one of those visits on a Monday or Tuesday that finds "no evidence" of illegal after-hours or weekend work?) The Stop Work Order on the building was lifted recently and residents say that none of the problems that led to the original order (damage to a building next door occupied by elderly residents and a sidewalk that has been undermined) have been fixed. More pics and info to follow tomorrow if work continues today. For the record, our caller said that work was going on at about eight sites that he had noticed and it's unknown how many of them had permits authorizing weekend work. The weekend permits aren't posted on the DOB website and don't have to be posted at construction sites, though doing so would eliminate a lot of confusion.