There haven’t been any frogs on Frog Alley for at least 75 years, when Kingston built Schwenk Drive to demolish a flood-prone slum neighborhood along the Esopus Creek and to convert the swampland below Peter Stuyvesant’s 1658 stockade. The frogs, though now becoming a receding memory, adapted to at least the first three centuries of Kingston’s white settlement without major change. It looks as though that won’t be true for the roadway that caused their departure.
Starting from Schwenk Drive and ending on North Front Street. the one-block-long alley hosts six uses in all, three on each side: A Central Hudson substation, an empty lot formerly occupied by Esposito’s dry-cleaning establishment, and Deising’s bakery and restaurant on one side, and on the other the Hudson Valley Federal Credit Union, the uptown city fire station, and the remnants of the historic Louw-Bogardus House built 350 years ago – plus an attractive small park.
Welcome to the neighborhood. GBC Kingston LLC has proposed a new 46-unit development at the ex-dry cleaning site consisting of four studios. 13 one-bedroom units, 22 two-bedroom apartments and four three-bedroom units. Six affordable units will be included. There’ll also be two live-work units.
The Westchester-based developers say the apartments will be clustered around four courtyards. They claim their design was inspired by the Belgian and Dutch “godhuis” a form of housing for the most vulnerable population. In Bruges, where they are most celebrated, the modest structures are no larger in height than a story and a half.
Though the artist’s renderings seem to show some building at three and a half stories rather than the promised three, the city response has been generally positive. The project is moving forward.
Ulster County is poised to spend $3.15 million this year on the recommendations of its Housing Action Fund to support six affordable-housing projects and one youth emergency housing project. The $15-million fund, augmented annually with a quarter of county revenues from the bed tax on motels and short-term rentals, has earmarked $380,000 for the Frog Alley project.
As for the post-frog Schwenk Drive, that’s up for review. In September, Kingston’s common council approved a zoning change to encourage mixed uses and higher density by transforming the four-lane arterial with trees in the middle into a two-lane city street.
The city is hoping for major change on the now-obsolete Schwenk Drive. Mayor Steve Noble said earlier this year that the changes to the roadway are not contingent on some version of the ambitious Kingstonian project being built.
State and federal funding are being sought.
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