A $100,000 advertising and marketing marketing campaign is aiming to rebrand a stretch of Jamaica. Queens with a hip-sounding acronym forward of a rezoning anticipated to rework the transit hub.
The brand new nickname “DJQ” — for greater than three dozen blocks alongside Jamaica Avenue — comes forward of a rezoning that officers consider will pave the best way for brand new residential items, outlets and public house.
“Jamaica has at all times been a business hub, and now it’s about bringing consciousness and opening individuals’s eyes as much as the truth that it is a place you could come and store and eat and wander round,” mentioned Whitney Barrat, president of Downtown Jamaica Partnership President Whitney Barrat, which is main the rebranding effort.
“It’s simply a lot simpler to begin from a model that’s identifiable … and get individuals accustomed to all of the neighborhood has to supply,” Barrat advised The Put up.
DJQ — quick for Downtown Jamaica, Queens — particularly describes the zone stretching from Sutphin Boulevard to 169th Avenue.
The $100,000 rebrand goals to “reframe perceptions of Jamaica from pass-through to vacation spot” by advocating for small companies, boosting public security and internet hosting family-friendly programming, in accordance with the group.
Town Planning Fee is about to vote subsequent month on a large Jamaica Space Rezoning Plan so as to add as much as 12,000 new houses – 4,000 of them completely inexpensive – and create an estimated 7,000 new jobs in hospitality, know-how and lightweight manufacturing.
“Past these zoning modifications, the plan would come with strategic investments to reinforce infrastructure, transit entry, open house, and extra,” metropolis paperwork learn.
On the similar time, the town plans to construct a one-acre park dubbed Station Plaza outdoors the Sutphin Boulevard subway station and a $70 million funding in road enhancements, each set to start in 2026.
The world has already been present process large modifications lately, Barrat mentioned, with a 13% inhabitants growth between 2010 and 2020 — outpacing the citywide inhabitants improve twofold — and a spate of latest luxurious high-rise flats started sprouting up because the pandemic.
Among the many latest choices are a barber store, bakery and ice cream store, alongside Elevating Cane’s, Shake Shack and Chipotle — however there’s nonetheless an unfulfilled demand for late-night eateries and nightlife to inject life into the world past the bustling LIRR, AirTrain and subway stations.
“We would like individuals to come back right here and store, not only for the transportation hub,” mentioned BID board member Sari Kulka, who hopes the rebrand will entice bookstores, pet shops, co-working areas, eating places and breweries sooner or later.
Now, the group is requesting metropolis funding for a handful of public security “ambassadors” to be the NYPD’s eyes and ears on the hall and preserve tabs on quality-of-life considerations like preventing, drug use and unlawful merchandising.
The BID hopes the local-led initiative will assist mitigate “one-size-fits-all” options like the town’s 2021 busway redesign, which wolfed up parking within the car-centric neighborhood and decimated enterprise for some locals, like Rincon Salvadoreno proprietor Elena Barcenes.
“I might in all probability say 75% of my clients are gone now,” Barcenes mentioned, noting longtime clients of her 40-year enterprise disappeared as a result of lack of parking and a surge in parking tickets issued.
Barcenes, who helps the rezoning venture, hopes to develop her enterprise with catering, in addition to nightlife choices with DJs as extra younger individuals transfer into the world.
The rezoning plan may additionally suggest modifications to the design of streets and enforcement of visitors laws to prioritize cyclists, seniors and other people with disabilities, per planning paperwork, as a part of the initiative set to fight the “huge housing scarcity” dealing with the neighborhood.
“It’s a optimistic factor for the neighborhood, I feel it will be an ideal choice for low-income individuals,” mentioned Bronx native Fabiola Cyriaque, 23, who has been dwelling in a homeless shelter in Jamaica since March.
“I’m excited.”
