Another Bay Ridge Religious Site Going Condo

Bay Ridge Jewish Center by Bay Ridge Bitches on Flickr.

Another Bay Ridge house of worship is closing the doors of its decades-old home and planning to sell to a developer. The Bay Ridge Jewish Center at 4th Avenue and 81st Street has seen its congregation dwindle over the years (the synagogue as built can hold 600, but the current congregation totals only about 100), and cannot feasibly maintain its current building.

On Wednesday the congregation voted 70 to 3 to tear down its current building, sell a parcel of the property to a developer, and use the profits from the sale to build a new smaller sanctuary on the remaining portion of the site. The pending sale parallels the situation at the Bay Ridge United Methodist Church (the “Green Church”) several blocks north on 4th Avenue, where worshipers put the church land on the market and hope to move to a smaller location. The move by the Green Church sparked a battle with preservationists who want to save the 108-year-old church, and who are now in a desperate search to find a buyer willing to retain the original structure.