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A Streetcar Named Disaster

Trolley King Files Suit Against Former Landlord

Carroll Gardens
March 29, 2004 Cobble Hill Courier

Brooklyn’s trolley maven is suing the landlord who gave his organization a free home for a decade. Bob diamond the president of the Brooklyn Historic Railway Association (BHRA), Alleges that Red Hook property owner Greg O’Connell Failed to make repairs to the site, preventing Diamond from realizing his dream of restoring trolley service to the borough.

Diamond is asking a civil court to award his group a minimum of $100,000 in damages, the income he says the group lost since the entryway to the trolley barn was damages in August 2001.

“The idea was to have a working trolley line to red Hook, not a stationary diorama inside a inaccessible building,” Diamond said.

Damage to the pier at the entryway to the barn has prevented the trolleys egress.

“It’s a shame he didn’t fix the damage in 2001,” Diamond said. “Apparently, he is very good talking on both sides of his mouth.”

O’Connell said he knew nothing of the lawsuit, which Diamond said was filed on March 18.

While he still thinks restoring trolley service is “a great idea.” O’Connell said the situation with BHRA “is very frustrating after a while.”

“You try to give him as much times as you can,” O’Connell said.

It’s been a long, strange trip for Diamond, who has devoted his life to trolleys.

Diamond and BHRA volunteers have installed 1,500 feet of track on a few blocks goal had been to build a rail link between Red Hook and Borough Hall.

But like two of Diamond best trolleys -one dating back to 1897 and a 1951 Pullman trolley-trapped inside O’Connell’s 8,000-foot barn, the dream has stagnated. Three other trolleys sit on the tracks along the pier.

Last November, O’Connell served Diamond with eviction papers ordering him to remove the trolleys from 480 Van Brunt Street.

O’Connell, the developer of the Fairway supermarket project, said he needs the space occupied by the BHRA’s equipment for the supermarket’s parking lot.

The trolleys and other equipment have sat idle on the property since the winter.

Last May, the city Department of Transportation trucked out some of the equipment not owned by the BHRA form the site.

The city withdrew its support for Diamond’s project, concerned that the BHRA was unable to secure private funds to keep it alive. “We couldn’t run the line for three years,” Diamond said. ” That had something to do with DOT scuttling the project,” he reasoned.

Even so, Diamond said he still hopes that the entryway to the bar will be repair one day soon, so that the trolley line will be “up and running” by the summer.

Diamond’s attorney, Jay Itkowitz, said Diamond and O’Connell had a lease agreement dating to 1998. In it, the attorney said, there is a provision that the DOT must be notified if any disputes arise. But Itkowitz said the city was never notified about the eviction notice Diamond received- a violation of the agreement. ” If he was going to take the position that the license agreement was ended, he needed to call a meeting,” the attorney said.

“Our position is that he will be able to prevail in evicting us,” Itkowitz said. The next court date for the matter will be March 30.

Despite the eviction notice, the relationship between Diamond and O’Connell remained amicable. In December, Diamond said if O’Connell, “”Besides being a businessman, Greg is also a visionary and a dreamer. He knows something is out there that is beyond making money.”

Know the kind words are few and far between.

“I should have known, with the eviction notice, where he was really coming from,” Diamond said. “He was probably not a supporter of the project for several years, but he paid lip service when necessary for good press relations.”

Asked why O’Connell would let the BHRA stay on the property for over 10 years free of charge, Diamond had this to say: “He did let us stay there, but then again, it was supposed to be an attraction for his development site.”

“BHRA put in a lot of seat equity, there was quid pro quo. He got a lot of work out of us,” he added, noting that the group worked on the site’s sewer lines, helped pave a pedestrian walkway, and did repair work on the bulkheads.

“It wasn’t just that he was being a nice guy donating space out of the kindness of his heart,” Diamond said. ” I was basically deluding myself thinking he was on the up and up.”

O’Connell remained incredulous. “I just say a prayer for this guy. I just wish him well.”