The Brooklyn Diocese is Turning a Century-Old Coney Island Church into Another Apartment Building

By Michael Gonik

If anything can be gleaned from the last decade or so of church-to-condo development in the borough, it’s that few do it well, and even fewer manage to build something people want to look at, much less live in.

So, it will be particularly interesting to see what happens with The Guardian Angel Roman Catholic Church, a century-old former house of worship in Coney Island that appears to be next on the holy chopping block. According to a recent Crain’s report, the church is now under the arm of Rocklyn Asset Corp., which is itself under the arm of the Catholic Church.

The divine plan for the church calls for a 13-story, 99-unit mixed-use apartment building with a daycare to be erected over its hallowed plot at 2978 Ocean Parkway, where it’s stood for 120 years. Unlike some of the other recent church conversions in the city, this one will preserve at least some of the former parish’s religious services, providing a room as a space for worship somewhere on the ground floor of the building.

Guardian Angel’s residential recalibration comes on the heels of a development dash in Coney Island, where a contentious proposal to build a casino along the boardwalk and over the iconic amusement park is facing serious pushback from local residents, business owners, activists, and people who don’t want to enter “traffic hell” the moment they step off the Wonder Wheel. “The Coney” project is vying for one of three casino licenses the state plans to grant by the end of the year.

Public hearings for the proposal have gotten heated. Last night, members of the community met elected officials and developers with picket signs and testimonies, rejecting the $3.4 billion casino plan and its potential impact on the neighborhood. “What we’re really being asked is to accept a future where our streets are privatized, our residents are displaced, and everything that makes Coney Island ours is traded for the profit of the developer,” said a Coney Island resident at the hearing.