Work at 360 Smith Starts with a Boo Boo

One gets the feeling that very little is going to happen at the 360 Smith development that will not be noticed. Over the weekend, we got an email that said "Work went on at 360 without the MTA knowing. The arrangement is that the MTA is ALWAYS supposed to know when work happens at 360." The development, which recently got building permits as well as an updated design, adjoins the Carroll Street subway station and the tunnels that carry the F and G lines. The details, as we got them, are that the developer has arranged for someone from the MTA to be on the site when work is being done, until the foundation (and the possibility of damaging the station or tunnel) is completed. "That person was not informed this week when work was being done on the site," our neighborhood source reports. "Some MTA workers saw the work and called someone at the MTA. Someone was sent out to inspect the job and, as far as I know, the work was stopped." Given that people in the neighborhood are watching the development closely, work at the former Heavy Metal Building site is likely to be interesting.

UPDATE: Council Member Bill de Blasio's District Director Tom Gray contradicts the report from residents, emailing to say, "The developer was just doing a test pit for his project. MTA had appropriate supervision there to observe."