It's a mini tromping around report! Here's some good Albany news that you might not have heard yet.
1. At Long Last, a Rooftop Patio
Remember The Copper Crow, the new craft cocktail and food place coming to the Warehouse District? According to an interview in the Albany Business Review, the owner, Jason Pierce of the Savoy, wants to put in a rooftop patio. The Business Review says it would be "one of the only rooftop dining spaces in Albany," but your humble Albablogger isn't sure where these other places are: the lack of cool rooftop spots around is pretty bizarre in a city with so much cool architecture that deserves to be gawked at from on high. Mr. Pierce is targeting a November opening, which will be post-patio season, but we might all be drinking craft cocktails with a Nipper view at this time next year.
2. Broadway Building Boom
Ian Benjamin over at the Albany Notes blog (which you should be following, if you aren't already) has posted an excellent writeup of the result of the last Albany planning board meeting. You can read the whole thing over there, but my chief takeaway is that three major projects are going to have a major impact on Broadway in the coming year or so. The Quackenbush Square, 67 Livingston Ave and and 39 Columbia Street projects are all very close to each other on the relatively barren stretch of Broadway between Columbia Street and the Warehouse District, and they'll be bringing a combined 248 new apartments and a ton of fresh landscaping and streetscape improvements to Broadway. The bars and restaurants of the warehouse district are actually only a short walk from the busier part of Broadway, but a lot of folks don't realize that because of how foreboding and pedestrian-unfriendly the stretch in between looks: hopefully these new improvements will encourage more natural flow between the two neighborhoods (having more people living nearby certainly won't hurt).
3. Central Fire Alarm Station Resurrection
About a year ago, All Over Albany posted an article about the beautiful old fire alarm station at 25 Delaware Ave. It's a quirky little architectural gem, it's been vacant for a decade and threatened with being demolished, and it's been on the Historic Albany Foundation's most endangered historic resources list for years. Now, though, it might finally be getting a break: a developer called Conifer wants to build apartments in the vacant lot behind the building and maintain the historic building as office/community center/gym space. The Historic Albany Foundation is supporting the project, which it considers to be a good use of the building that won't impact its historic character. If you want to comment in favor, the Historic Resources Commission will be considering the project on May 1st.