What do you do when, like Patrick and Eve Carr, you want a shorter drive to work and a nice amenity-packed building, and you don’t want to give up the beach life that you had near your old house?
That’s easy — you move to Long Island City. The high-rises have sand on the roof.
“Coming from Long Beach, we were always at the beach,” says Eve, who just moved with her husband into 4545 Center Blvd., a 41-story rental that includes on its long list of amenities 50,000 square feet of outdoor space with a reflecting pool, plus a dog run, that will be open later this summer. (The building is not fully finished, but move-ins started last month.)
Matthew McDermott; Christian Johnston(inset)
Eve and Patrick Carr just moved into the 820-unit TF Cornerstone building at 4545 Center Blvd., one of the many new rentals in Long Island City, Queens.
“We’ll be able to play tennis, beach volleyball, or something like that — to have these amenities, that was something we were really excited about.” (Yes, tennis and volleyball courts are also promised.)
“We started looking at the area a few years ago, before we bought our house,” Patrick says. “We just saw it getting built up on our daily commute.”
The buildup has been impressive. “This was really designed as an amenity building [for] all the holdings,” says Scott Walsh, director of sales and market research for TF Cornerstone, of 4545 Center Blvd. The building is the latest, and — at 820 units — largest, in the developer’s massive portfolio of LIC waterfront buildings, which has been going strong since 2006. (Studios at 4545 Center Blvd. start at $2,150, and units go up to $5,580 for a 1,261 -square-foot three-bedroom.)
Essentially, 4545 Center Blvd. is also doing what every other developer in the neighborhood is doing: plugging the gaps to make LIC truly livable. And, yes, LIC is getting there.
Walk along Vernon Boulevard (the main drag of the Hunters Point section of LIC) and one sees ads for LIC Flea, Queens’ answer to the Brooklyn vintage shopping and food fair that started in 2008 (although the two are unrelated). LIC Flea, which starts on June 15, will take place in the parking lot at 5-22 46th Ave. and have vendors like pizza purveyor Manducatis Rustica and Malu Ice Cream, not to mention retailers like Matted (an art and gift shop).
Popular cafe Sweetleaf has teamed up with one of the other neighborhood favorites, the speakeasy-like Dutch Kills, for a coffeehouse by day/bar by night in 4615 Center Blvd.’s retail space. A brand-new K-8 public school, PS/IS 312, is opening at 4615 Center Blvd. this September for the budding number of families. The art scene got a boost from venues like Diego Salazar Antique Frames and the adjoining Diego Salazar Art Gallery.
