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Originally part of Bushwick, the area that would become Williamsburg was an important ferry point for farmers and gardeners moving their products to Manhattan. It was renamed Williamsburgh (and, finally, Williamsburg in 1852) after the Colonel Jonathan Williams, a U.S. Engineer, who survey the region.
Early industry valued the deep drafts along the East River. This encouraged industrialists, many from Germany, to build shipyards around Williamsburg. Raw material was shipped in, and finished products were sent out of factories straight to the docks. Several sugar barons built processing refineries, such as the now-defunct Domino Sugar. Other important industries included shipbuilding and brewing.
In the mid-1800s wealthy New Yorkers such as Cornelius Vanderbilt and railroad magnate Jubilee Jim Fisk built shore-side mansions. Corning Glass Works was founded in Williamsburg before moving upstate to Corning, New York. German immigrant, chemist Charles Pfizer founded Pfizer Pharmaceutical in Williamsburg, and the company maintained an industrial plant in the neighborhood through 2007.
The Williamsburg Bridge, completed in 1903, further opened up the community to thousands of upwardly mobile immigrants and second-generation Americans fleeing the overcrowded slum tenements of Manhattan's Lower East Side. Refugees from war-torn Europe began to stream into Brooklyn during and after World War II, including the Hasidim whose populations had been devastated in the Holocaust. Hispanics from Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic also began to settle in the area.
Prior to the mid-1990s, artists valued the low rents and large spaces available in Williamsburg. The area began gentrification and development at the end of the 20th century, and accelerated with the 2005 rezoning of the North Side and Greenpoint waterfront.
The rezoning represented a dramatic shift of scale in the ongoing process of gentrification in the area since the early 1990s. The waterfront neighborhoods, once characterized by active manufacturing and other light industry interspersed with smaller residential buildings, were rezoned primarily for residential use. Alongside the construction of new residential buildings, many warehouses were converted into residential loft buildings.
The main subway line are the L train in the north and the J, M and Z lines in the south, while the G line connects Williamsburg to Long Island City and the rest of Brooklyn. The Brooklyn Queens Expressway cuts through the middle of the area and the Williamsburg Bridge provides quick access to Manhattan.
M1 districts range from the Garment District in Manhattan, with its multistory lofts, to parts of Red Hook and College Point with many one or two-story warehouses studded with loading bays. The M1 district is often a buffer between M2 or M3 districts and adjacent residential or commercial districts.
Light industries typically found in M1 areas include knitting mills, printing plants, woodworking shops, auto storage and repair shops, and wholesale service and storage facilities. In theory, nearly all industries uses can locate in M1 areas if they meet the more stringent M1 performance standards. Offices and most retail uses are also permitted. Certain community facilities, such as hospitals, are allowed in M1 districts only by special permit, but houses of worship are allowed as-of-right.
Floor area ratios in M1 districts range from 1.0 to 10.0 and building height and setbacks are controlled by sky exposure planes which may be penetrated by towers in certain districts. New industrial buildings are usually low-rise structures that fit within sky exposure planes. Except along district boundaries, no side yards are required. Rear yards at least 20 feet deep are usually required, except within 100 feet of a corner.
The M1-1 districts are usually near residential neighborhoods and frequently act as a low bulk buffer at the periphery of older industrial areas with heavier industrial uses and larger buildings. Typically, buildings in this zone cover approximately 75 percent of the lot and would have on-site open parking at the rear of the lot. M1-1 districts require off-street parking of one space per 2,000 sf, or per 3 employees, whichever is less. The maximum FAR is 1.0.