WikiHeights. This is a website about Prospect Heights that everybody (including you) can write and edit. You can start your own page. You can even make a link to a page that doesn’t exist yet (so you or somebody else can create it later). To learn about how this works, click on the Help page. But it’s pretty simple–you can just click on the “edit” tab and start typing. You’ll figure it out.

DAILYHEIGHTS is now serving as Moderator of the District 35 Community Gazette over at GothamGazette.com, a non-profit NYC news and policy website published by the Citizens Union Foundation of New York.

District 35 is shaped like a big boot, stretching from Metrotech and the Navy Yards, down through Prospect Heights, and out to Schenectady Ave. So Prospect Heights is in the heart of the district. Or heel? Actually, more like shin. Whatever.

The Community Gazettes are supposed to be like little local newspapers, created and read by people like you. Some of you have already discovered the site and posted there, but in case you haven’t, the Community Gazettes are “an effort at creating an online community for people who care about their own neighborhoods … we traffic in issues, and look to solve problems.”

So, what’s bugging you? Go vent:

-Upload a photo.
-Repost an entire newspaper article. Verbatim. (They, uh, assure me that local newspapers are cool with this practice.)
-Create a “Fix It” report on a pothole, broken traffic light, graffiti, etc. and discover entirely new and interactive ways of being ignored.
-Post ideas, comments or “general gripes” in the Community Views section.
-Add links to community resources.
-More! (Too lazy to list the rest.)

This site is like a Three Stooges routine: When Curly patches up the pipe leak here, water starts squirting out over there. When he patches up the pipe over there, the pipe springs another leak and he gets sprayed in the face. Then Moe comes over and whacks him on the head.

The problem of the moment is inaccurate comment counts. Any Movable Type gurus out there? It would be great to know why some of the Category Archives pages don’t accurately report the number of comments (see Marty Reads Script, Then Splits entry on the Ratner Category page), while other pages seem to be fine (i.e. the Bars and Nightlife page).

I tried to find the exact spot where photographer Percy Loomis Sperr stood 75 years ago when he took this photo of 353 Park Place at Underhill Avenue. On the right is my attempt to redo his photo. There have been some changes. Goodbye, stately mansion. Hello, institutional architecture. [Click here for the full photo comparison.]

Image from the New York Public Library (NYPL) Digital Gallery. The original photo can be found here.

Freelancer Julie Gilgoff interviewed Peace Corps volunteer Irene Porges for Newsday: “… at age 62, Porges decided to leave the comforts of her brownstone apartment in Prospect Heights and joined the Peace Corps as a volunteer in Bulgaria.”

“…(in) a mountain community of about 10,000 people, she felt she was going against local customs just by doing her job as a community economic development volunteer. ‘If you’re over age 60 in the community where I lived, you’re sent out to pasture …You don’t work.’”

“… Over time, however, Porges said she got to know the other female professionals in town … During her stay, Porges created a business center where she helped train local artisans to market their goods.”

[IMAGE: Bruce Gilbert for Newsday]