Bushwick, Brooklyn - Emerging Neighborhood or Pure Hype / Lies??

July 30, 2009 12:48 PM

Moving within Brooklyn - Should I consider Bushwick as a potential neighborhood?

So my sister’s and I have started to look on Craigslist for apartments (previous) and we have some questions. We would like to hear from people who currently live in or recently moved out of the following neighborhoods – Bushwick, Bed-Stuy and East Williamsburg.

We see a lot of listing for these neighborhoods with excellent rental prices and ample square footage, but these neighborhoods are completely unknown to us and we don’t want to jump in to a rental contract blind.

Currently two of us live in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn and one of us lives in The South Bronx. We would like our neighborhood to be on par with Clinton Hill / Fort Greene or better.

So if you know these neighborhoods as they currently are, please give me your opinions on amenities, safety, transportation hassles, etc.

posted by Julnyes to home & garden (22 comments total)

It's not bad. I lived in East Williamsburg for a while and liked the relative ease with which I could get places and it's really only getting better with more and more cool places opening up. The bad? Prepare for hipster onslaught. I never really felt cool enough to live there, which may or may not be a problem that you'd have.

I'd say it's comparable to some of the sketchier parts of Clinton Hill / Fort Greene. Like most NYC neighborhoods, just go and walk around to really get a feel for the place.
posted by youcancallmeal at 12:52 PM on July 30

I have a friend who lives in Bed-Stuy, and although she's got a lot of room, she has noticed the neighborhood getting sketchier in the past year (and it wasn't that great to begin with...). As in, had to step over the junkie passed out on her stoop the other day.
posted by witchstone at 12:54 PM on July 30

Bushwick is, uh, "picking up". The Jefferson L-Stop area is getting quite nice. Bed-Stuy is where the trouble really starts nowadays.
posted by GilloD at 12:56 PM on July 30

where did that apostrophe come from in sisters?? anyway ..

GilloD - what do you mean by "picking up"?

youcancallmeal - thanks, we were planning on looking around next weekend to see what these neighborhoods are like during the summer. What train stop would be a good starting point for East Williamsburg do you think?
posted by Julnyes at 1:00 PM on July 30

If you want to live in a very sketchy neighborhood, Bushwick/Bed Stuy is the place for you.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 1:03 PM on July 30

I'd start around the Morgan L stop and work your way south and eastward.
posted by youcancallmeal at 1:03 PM on July 30

Oh lordy, are they REALLY calling it East Williamsburg now - or is it still a euphemism only used in regard to real estate?

I used to live off the Morgan Ave stop in 2004. It wasn't truly horrible, but it wasn't great either. Five years has probably improved things?

The commute on the L train in the mornings was truly a miserable experience though. I've never been packed into a subway car like that before or since.
posted by elsietheeel at 1:09 PM on July 30 [1 favorite has favorites]

elsietheeel - I live in Clinton Hill so I have had the experience of a morning commute involving the G and the L train - I believe I have just out-horribled you! I take the Q train instead now and my morning is a little brighter for it. So if East Williamsburg isn't really the name, what is? Greenpoint? I really don't know the area.
posted by Julnyes at 1:27 PM on July 30

Greenpoint is farther north, past the Lorimer L. Ignore the haters, it's East Williamsburg.
posted by youcancallmeal at 1:33 PM on July 30

There really is an East Williamsburg, but it depends on where you're talking about.
posted by JaredSeth at 1:34 PM on July 30

I live in Bed-Stuy right now, across the street from the Bedford-Nostrand stop on the G. I really love the neighborhood, but I'm pretty comfortable with sketchiness--it was certainly a step up from Flatbush, where I used to live. What's good about Bed-Stuy, or my part of it anyway, is that it is a gentrifying neighborhood that froze up mid-gentrification, so prices are still relatively low and the poor-people infrastructure is still there, but there are nice coffee shops and white faces don't attract undue attention. (In Flatbush one of the locals said to me that although there were white people living there, they try to never go outside for fear of getting fucked with. In Bed-Stuy there's much less of that.)
posted by nasreddin at 1:51 PM on July 30

Sorry, that comment was racist--I assumed you were white for no good reason.
posted by nasreddin at 1:54 PM on July 30

By "Picking Up", I mean the Jefferson stop has some cute little cafes and a Mini Golf Course and some refurbed apartments. It's not as likely to make your Mom cry as it was
posted by GilloD at 2:12 PM on July 30

I lived there eons ago. I am white and the neighborhood was pretty much entirely black. I never had a problem. If it is in the midst of being gentrified, things might be getting tense (not just racially), especially if a bunch of hipsters are moving in. I at one time qualified as a hipster, and even I found myself annoying. I found the area interesting and I loved the physical environment. I like funky urban environments. Now to try and figure out why I am living in an exceedingly isolated rural one, but that is a question for another day.
posted by fifilaru at 2:39 PM on July 30

There really is an East Williamsburg, but it depends on where you're talking about.

Neighborhood names change as neighborhoods change. When I was a kid there was no "NoHo" or "East Village" - that was all part of the Lower East Side. There was no SoHo - that was just part of Little Italy. There was no Tribeca, Windsor Terrace, or Inwood...

So sure, what is now getting called "East Williamsburg" used to be part of the larger area that was called Bushwick, the same way the East Village used to just be encompassed within the Lower East Side (there was no East and West village, just Greenwich Village, which was on the West Side), but that doesn't mean it isn't a useful determination. The part of Bushwick that's further out, still called Bushwick, is a sketchier neighborhood. East Williamsburg has been somewhat gentrified already. If you move to the Halsey or Wilson stops on the L, you will have a different kind of neighborhood than if you move to the Graham or Grand.

Basically, until Grand you can walk to cute little bars and nice shops etc. Montrose thru about Jefferson have somewhat random options, sometimes an occasional health food store or cafe but also some fair amount of kids hanging on the street, broken glass and loud music. After Myrtle you will be living next to block parties and will see only occasional people from outside the neighborhood. There are artists collectives and communities but still, the streets are dominated by the people who grew up there. There are more storefront churches than cappucino spots, and all through the summer everyone spends the evenings sitting outside drinking and playing loud hiphop on their stoop or sidewalk with kids running around until midnight. No restaurants except fast food or pizza.
posted by mdn at 2:43 PM on July 30 [2 favorites has favorites]

instead of reacting incredulously, why not explain what is good about the stop you live off? The part of bushwick i'm in has no restaurants and not very interesting coffee shops. Other parts of the area I've lived in have had variations on this, and the further east you go the more amenities there are.

That doesn't make it a bad neighborhood; it just makes it a) one for homebodies; b) one for people-in-the-know, who are hooked up to whatever underground scene is happening; or c) one for adventurers / extroverts, who are willing to set themselves down and start talking to the guys playing dominoes next door, or whatever, and get involved with the folks who've been here a while.

But like I said, there is some randomness in the stops between montrose and myrtle - some of it is pretty industrial, some of it much more spruced up. I've never lived off Dekalb (though I think a friend had a place with a backyard near there... if I'm remembering right, it looked like a decent area)
posted by mdn at 3:23 PM on July 30

Bushwick (according to cops who showed up when a friend's place was robbed) has a lot more break-in crime than any other hood in brooklyn. I've lived in bed stuy, and overall it's pretty nice. It depends on how far out you go what the amenities are like. I don't like bushwick very much, but living in an overpriced loft with a bunch of 20-somethings isn't really my bag--Bed stuy has a lot of nice brownstones to choose from.

That said, "on par" with clinton hill is going to leave you with park slope and cobble hill. Probably out of your price range. If you are looking for some yuppie ideal where you pay 1100 for a 2 bedroom apartment and then go downstairs to the cafe bar for a croissant and a mimosa, well, good luck.
posted by shownomercy at 3:36 PM on July 30

Have you considered Queens? I loved the lower parts Astoria with every fiber of my being - although my Brooklyn-dwelling friends refused to come visit me.
posted by elsietheeel at 5:01 PM on July 30

Have some answers been deleted, because I certainly haven't asked for a lily white neighborhood (since ya know I'm not white) and I certainly didn't mention anything about a yuppie deal with mimosas and croissants. I just wanted peoples opinions of the listed neighborhoods.

I feel like there is some other conversation going on here that I am unaware of...
posted by Julnyes at 6:14 PM on July 30

Yeah, there sort of is. I think it's just that people are assuming you're looking for the same things they'd be looking for. Where "they" might be a certain demographic that maybe not everyone is in. (I say this as part of that demographic too, so I'm not throwing stones.) It might help clarify the answers if you asked what it is specifically you're looking to find out about the neighborhoods when you say "on par with clinton hill/ft greene- quality of schools? Good supermarkets? Friendliness? Types of housing?
posted by Dormant Gorilla at 8:11 AM on July 31

Uh, another " was needed in there somewhere.
posted by Dormant Gorilla at 8:12 AM on July 31

I live between the Bedford-Nostrand and Classon G stops. I'm in Clinton Hill according to some people and Bed-Stuy according to others. Where I live is great, as far as I'm concerned. There were a couple of muggings a few months back, and I'm always careful to be aware of my surroundings, but that's just good practice. I don't go east of Bedford much, but when I have, it feels poorer the further east I go. And unfortunately, poor areas are higher crime areas.

Amenities are not great, but there's a decent grocery store a few blocks away. As for bars/coffee shops/restaurants, there aren't many, but all my friends live in the Slope these days, so I gotta travel for socialization activities anyway.
posted by Mavri at 8:52 AM on July 31