Are they city-approved bulkheads or illegal cabanas?
That’s what residents of Cobble Hill were wondering this week after David Walentas’s controversial — and city mandated 50-foot-tall — project on Atlantic Avenue suddenly sprouted three bright yellow boxes above the roofline.
Watchdogs feared that the structures are illegal cabanas similar to the beachy doodads atop other Walentas luxury buildings.
Walentas — who tried, but failed, to get an exemption on the the Cobble Hill Historic District’s 50-foot height cap this fall — replied that the structures are merely mechanical bulkheads, and they’ve been approved by the Department of Buildings and the Landmarks Preservation Commission.
The landmarks agency confirmed that its 2006 approval allows Walentas to build bulkheads atop the 50-foot building, which is next door to the future Trader Joe’s at the corner of Court Street. But the agency also said it would investigate whether the developer was illegally building his beloved cabanas.
