Passed along without comment: Three residential buildings on Manhattan's Far West Side "Dump the Trump name"

You can watch 15 seconds' worth of video of the de-Trumpification of one of the affected buildings on Manhattan's Far West Side on the DNAinfo New York website.

by Ken

Like it says up above, this DNAinfo New York post is passed along without comment, except to underscore the actual status of what are described below variously as "three Trump residential buildings" and the "Trump Place buildings" on Manhattan's Far West Side. As the residents noted in that petition signed by "more than 500 people": "Trump leases his name to buildings he does not own." (Note too that the "Riverside Blvd." on which these buildings are situated is not to be confused with the West Side's long-familiar "Riverside Ave."

A worker removes the president-elect's name from Trump Place at 160 Riverside Blvd. Wednesday, Nov. 16, 2016.

UPPER WEST SIDE -- Donald Trump won the White House, but he just lost part of the Upper West Side.

Three Riverside Boulevard buildings bearing his brand removed the silver letters of Trump's name from their facade Wednesday after residents signed a petition to dissociate themselves from the controversial candidate.*

Susan Rose, 58, watched workers remove the name.

“So do you have to vote for Trump to live here?” she jokingly asked a friend who lives in one of the buildings.

Rose added that she thinks people in the building will be relieved to not have the name.

“They don’t feel honored,” she said. “If he doesn’t own the building why burden them with his name?”

But a resident who lives in 140 Riverside Blvd. said she had no idea the name was being taken off until she walked out of her building Wednesday morning.

“They should have asked everybody,” said the resident, who has lived in the building since 2001. “Nobody was aware.”

More than 500 people signed the petition to change the name and the building owner, Equity Residential, said it wanted a more “neutral building identity.”

The buildings will now go by their street address.

*Note: The link harks back to Ben Fractenberg's Tuesday DNAinfo New York post, "Trump Place Buildings to Drop President-Elect's Name, Owner Says":

MANHATTAN -- Three Trump residential buildings on the Upper West Side are changing their names after residents petitioned to distance themselves from the president-elect, according to building owner Equity Residential.

The Trump Place buildings at 140, 160 and 180 Riverside Boulevard will drop the Trump branding and use just their address.

"We are assuming a more neutral building identity that will appeal to all current and future residents," Equity Residential spokesman Marty McKenna said in a statement.

More than 500 people signed a petition titled “Dump The Trump Name” in October.

"Many of the staff members of our building are minorities or immigrants; working in a building bearing his name is insulting to them," residents wrote in the petition.

"Since Trump leases his name to buildings he does not own, part of our rent is being used to increase Trump’s net worth."

Perhaps consideration might have been given to simply replacing the "Trump" name with "Conniving Scumbag." (Oh wait, was that a comment?)


This view from the Hudson River shows the mostly condominium development built on "Riverside Boulevard," the street cut through the Riverside South development site, onetime New York Central railroad yards. According to Wikipedia, Trump bailed out of the project before anything was built: "Trump sold Riverside South to investors from Hong Kong and China, who began construction in 1997. In 2005, the investors sold the remaining unfinished portions to the Carlyle Group and the Extell Development Company."

#