Category talk:West-Park Presbyterian Church

Two buildings

I'm afraid we're a little mixed up here. We've got two photos on 86th Street, but they are two blocks apart and one is of a gray stone building and one red brick. Jim.henderson (talk) 12:27, 16 April 2014 (UTC)

Jim: I hope I get this right. The red brick building is the West-Park Presbyterian Church Building - you can see it on their website. The "triple banner" is in from of the Church of St. Paul & St. Andrew, which Iguess West-Park also uses, along with the synagogue.

I am definitely confused. I was hoping the nycago site would clarify the situation as it often does, but it doesn't mention West Park on 10th Ave. Maybe they never had an organ. My guess is, the Presbyterians have shut their decrepit red brick building, moved in with the Episcopalians in their functional gray stone building on 11th Ave, but maintain the theory that the old building is their home. If my Plan A to go to New Jersey tomorrow doesn't happen, then Plan B is to mosey on up to 86th St and look for someone to ask. Lacking sectarian clarity, we can set up the categories by something like date or street address names. No big hurry. Jim.henderson (talk) 01:08, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

I note that the red brick church has scaffolding around it, so maybe sharing the St. P & St. A Church is a temporary thing, while the West-Park building is being renovated. The St. P & St. A. website mentions the other churches the building is being shared with, but not West-Park, and yet your "triple banner" shows that (at least at one point) they were there. Beyond My Ken (talk) 17:14, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

This 2011 article in the Times refers to the church as "abandoned".

OK, maybe here's the answer, from this other 2011 Times article:

FOR about three years the West-Park Presbyterian Church, at the corner of 86th Street and Amsterdam Avenue, sat abandoned as architects, congregants and preservationists squabbled over a plan to build condominiums above the rosy, Romanesque Revival structure. When landmark designation last year quashed development plans, worshipers returned to a building much in need of repairs. In the parish house that abuts the chapel, paint peels, damp patches spread, and musty odors rise from the basement.

So maybe the sequence goes something like this:

• Dilapidated West-Park building needs serious repairs, so congregation decamps for St. P & St. A (during that period of time you take the "triple banner" picture
• Congregation hopes to either develop the space for $$ or use the air rights to build condos over it...
• But instead the building is landmarked, squashing many of those plans (or making them more complicated and expensive)
• So the congregation gives in and returns to the church.

Something like that. Beyond My Ken (talk) 17:25, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

When I lived in midtown, West 86th was pretty far uptown for me. Now that I've moved uptown, it's pretty far downtown for me. And with the respiratory ailment that's bedeviled me all week, I doubt I'm going to get a chance to do any field work to check out the various churches involved here. If you can get to them, that might help clear things up. Beyond My Ken (talk) 17:28, 17 April 2014 (UTC)

Reasonable hypothesis, probably confirmable. My hay fever is slight but I promised to spend today in and around East Harlem with two historical / architectural / walking / bicycling tours. Changing my route to go up West 86th St probably wouldn't help. Walking up the West side tomorrow, Easter Sunday, gives better chances to meet someone. Jim.henderson (talk) 11:18, 19 April 2014 (UTC)