The Queens Gazette 25th Anniversary Edition 1982-2007
Then And Now

1983- Housing: The first stirrings of what would eventually authorize the sprawling Queens West development along 70 acres of Long Island City waterfront property cleared of decrepit old buildings appeared in an early March 1983 issue of the Gazette.

The story reported that Borough President Donald R. Manes was eager to have legislation in Albany approved because it would provide $100 million for the Long Island City- Hunters Point waterfront cleanup at a minimum. The ensuing development, at the time referred to as the only "major waterfront development", was desired for the improvements, such as luxury housing, so it would make the area opposite the United Nations across the East River more attractive. Building activity also meant that new jobs and industry would be created.

Eventually the initial legislation authorizing the Port Authority to clean up the waterfront was approved and Queens West developers entered the scene many years after.

Early this year, new housing on the Queens West site was again in the news, but not the luxury apartment houses, two of which have already been built and are occupied. The story was about "affordable housing" for low- and middleincome people that Mayor Michael Bloomberg was proposing on the Queens West waterfront on a site to be purchased by the city. Ironically, low- and middle-income groups complained that the mayor's proposal excluded them because of income guidelines.

Hospitals: Astoria General Hospital, which opened in 1950, had grown into one of the major healthcare facilities in Western Queens by 1984.

The 235-bed, full service, 24-hour-a-day facility, was logging 18,000 patient visits a year (three-quarters of them outpatients), had special diagnostic and full support facilities, among them an intensive care unit opened in 1980.

Located at Crescent Street and 30th Avenue, it attracted patients from neighboring communities and was assisted in treating its multi-language patient population by a staff whose members spoke 33 different languages among them.

During the 1990s, vast changes in the nation's healthcare system came about, among them the acquisition of local hospitals by major institutions. Here in Western Queens, Astoria General Hospital was acquired by the prestigious Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan and became Mount Sinai Hospital of Queens.

Among the improvements made at the facility was the acquisition of a state-of-the-art MRI for its Imaging Center. City Councilmember Peter Vallone Jr. (D- Astoria) led the effort to secure $2 million from the council to purchase the $4 million unit.