Over the past few weeks we’ve been receiving steady word that construction has been taking place at the long established illegal and unsafe construction site at 123 87th Street — located on the left and middle of the photo below. 

Despite there being three longstanding complete stop work orders issued by the NYC Department of Buildings and the fact that the construction is both illegally over the property line and out of zoning — as found by the New York State Supreme Court – or the fact that engineers have deemed the construction to have been unsafely attached to the neighboring foundation, construction activity has continued to go on at the address. 

People have been reporting the latest construction activity to 311 and we’ve both seen and heard the construction with our own eyes and ears about a week and a half ago (too many hired goons with tools that could easily be transformed into weapons lingering about to dare snap photos), but whenever the Department of Buildings has come around to check things out again and again, they weren’t able to find any signs of new illegal construction activity — they couldn’t even find what we’ve heard to be about a large 10′ x 18′ structure that has been built in the backyard.

When they have found construction activity going on at the site, despite there being a full stop work order, the Department of Buildings deemed the work legal, since it was merely the drilling of probes – go figure how drilling is within legal bounds of a full stop work order.

Given all of this illegal and unsafe construction, the best thing that the Department of Buildings has been able to do was to reattach a stop work order to the fence, which they did yesterday.

Our sources have informed us that this posted stop work order is at least the fourth one posted to the site, yet the homeowners and construction crew at 123 87th Street keep doing as they please, both removing the posted stop work orders and continueto get by doing as they please with the site – failing to safely remove illegal construction that is unsafely attached to a neighboring home.

For now, the neighborhood will continue to have to live with the obnoxious, illegal, unsafe and unsightly activities of the homeowners…

It simply amazes us how a supposedly civilized society cannot get any sort of results and all of this makes us wonder:

How long will the newest stop work order remain posted?

How much longer will it take for criminal charges to finally be leveled against the homeowners of 123 87th Street? 

What will it take for the Department of Buildings and the City of New York to finally grow some balls and force the owners of 123 87th Street to tear down the illegal construction in a safe manner?