Woolsey State Post Office (Photo: Google)
June 4, 2020 By Christian Murray
The post office building on 31st Street by the Ditmars Blvd. train station has just sold for $7.35 million, according to the real estate brokerage firm RIPCO.
The property, located at 2268 31st St., is home to the 7,668-square foot Woolsey Station Post Office. The building is currently tenanted by the United States Postal Service.
The building, which according to RIPCO was owned and sold by Ditmars Associates LLC, was purchased by an entity called LG Astoria LLC.
Records indicated that LG Astoria LLC is an arm of the Lam Generation, a real estate company best known for being in the hotel industry.
Details as to what is in store for the property were not released. A representative of RIPCO was not available for comment and Lam Generation could not be reached.
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14 Comments
So they might not have a Post Office there? First the supermarket, KeyFood across the street, and now the P.O. What are these residents supposed to do?
i don’t see the need for postal office /service
mostly junk mail and a waste of taxpayer’s money.
antiquated hopefully will be gone in 10 years
Like closing supermarkets to make way for more apartment buildings or restaurants, where are older people going to go to get stamps or mail things?
They are not closing the post office. They only sold the building. Old timers like me can tell you that the original post office was just north of Ditmars Blvd. on 31st Street (a couple of doors down from the public library) and that it was about three times the size of the current one. It was gutted by a fire that took out several other businesses along that strip. There are plenty of empty storefronts on 31st Street; I’m sure USPS will have no problem finding another location. Frankly, the spot that was sold was inadequate for the number of people who use the post office. It was the old Ditmars Theater many, many moons ago. I hope the space they move into is a lot larger and more modern.
Great MEMORIES of my youth Saturday morning would go bowling (key food supermarket )then in the afternoon go to the movies (the Ditmars movie house) the Post Office.
People have worked for their pensions often at lower salaries than others. Leave the pensions alone
As a born and bred Astorian do we really need another large development in an already crowded area ? Just sayin
This is yet another landgrab… all done very quietly but constantly.
Why is this a landgrab? Seems like the buyer paid a premium price for a well located piece of property and will probably spend a bit of money redeveloping it. Are you just jealous that you didn’t do it or couldn’t afford to do it yourself?
Are they bringing back the Greek movie theater
There are other solutions to saving the postal service at no cost to taxpayers. Part of the problem is that Congress in 2006 mandated that the Post Office fully fund 75 years of retirement benefits for employees. This has contributed billions to the Post Office’s long term debt. While many private and other public retirement plans are under funded, the Post Office is vastly over funded. It is time for Congress to amend legislation and afford the Post Office ability to fund its retirement plan at a more reasonable level.
There are other initiatives which could assist the Postal Service in avoiding frequent postage stamp increases. The Post Office should continue with more joint business ventures like Amazon in expanding Sunday delivery. This could be the start of something big. Using underutilized assets and facilities on Sunday could generate badly needed revenues. This would assist in developing alternatives to the periodic increasing frequency of raising the price of a first class stamps every few years. Why not consider going after other available untapped potential revenue streams? Consider these untapped sources to reduce operating deficits and perhaps even turn a small profit. The US Postal Service could sell advertising space on the sides of mailboxes, inside and outside the post offices along with the small jeeps, regular trucks and heavy-duty long-haul trucks. Sell off some of the valuable real estate and move to less expensive locations.
Why not join banks and fast-food restaurants that sublet space at Wal-Mart and other big box stores to open smaller post offices? Generate both revenue and customers by subletting excess capacity at underutilized post offices to other village, town, county, city, state or federal agencies along with private sector businesses. License corporations to sponsor stamps for a fee.
Have members of Congress, State Legislatures and other elected officials pay the real, full costs for their annoying frequent bulk rate mailings to constituents. They are nothing more than free re-election campaign brochures subsidized by taxpayers. Charge the full price for all junk mail. Future increases in the price of stamps should be directly tied to inflation.
The Post Office should apply free-enterprise solutions including working with Amazon and other private sector businesses to provide a more cost-effective product, reduce deficits and prevent more branches from closing thus keeping its commitment to serve the public well
Larry Penner
I rolled my eyes when I started reading this and then I got to the end and you actually have good ideas .
Long winded Larry strikes again.
I worked for the P.O. for almost 39 yrs, I couldn’t have said this any better.
Unfortunately during all that time I can count on 1 hand how many good decisions the P.O. has made.There are many ways the P.O. can, & has in past decades, made $$. Do you really think if it was losing all the $$ they say they do all these decades it would still be in existence? Gov’t knows the $$ it gets in that yearly payout & would NEVER want to lose it!