'Robert De Niro Way'? No Way, Says CB1 Committee On Street Co-Name

Robert De Niro, and (right) the corner of Greenwich and Franklin streets where Tribeca Enterprises wants to place a street sign that honors the actor. De Niro is shown during an appearance before Community Board 1's Landmarks Committee in 2008, where he sought to defend a penthouse atop the Greenwich Hotel, which he co-developed. The structure was much larger than the Landmarks Commission had approved. Photos: Carl Glassman/Tribeca Trib

Who deserves to have their name on a Lower Manhattan street sign? For years, Community Board 1 has wrestled with the question of street co-naming, sometimes painfully before the families and friends of laudable nominees. Finally, in January, the board introduced a new set of guidelines meant to make its position clear: If the person hasn’t been dead for at least 20 years, please find another way to honor them.

Then along comes Robert De Niro.

Tribeca Enterprises, the Tribeca-based network of entertainment businesses co-founded by De Niro, wants to honor the renowned actor with his own street sign, co-naming the northeast corner of Greenwich and Franklin streets, next to the company’s headquarters and Tribeca Grill, “Robert De Niro Way.” 

De Niro turns 80 in August and the company is asking the city to include the tribute as part of a September “multi-day event to celebrate his birthday,” said Peter Downing, who came before Community Board 1’s Transportation and Street Permits Committee on March 7 to pitch the application.

De Niro “truly was an early investor in Tribeca businesses and community development helping to encourage economic redevelopment of the neighborhood with key investments at critical stages in this district’s urban renewal,” said Downing, an independent entertainment director and producer and longtime liaison to the community for Tribeca Enterprises events.

No one on the committee questioned De Niro’s impact on Tribeca. Most memorable was the spirits-lifting post-9/11 Tribeca Film Festival he co-founded in 2002 with Jane Rosenthal and Craig Hatkoff, and the accompanying Tribeca Family Festival that was a neighborhood tradition for 14 years.

But Robert De Niro Way?

No way, said the committee majority.

“I appreciate everything that he has done, and does do,” said CB1 chair Tammy Meltzer. “But I hesitate because there are many exemplary New Yorkers in Lower Manhattan, and where do we draw the line?”

“I respect Mr. De Niro, he’s a great actor. He has all of these businesses that have brought him money, but he did nothing to help the people who were most affected by 9/11,” said CB1 member Pat Moore, who lived close to the World Trade Center and was out of her home for two years.

The new street co-naming guidelines have strict criteria for three categories of nominees: organizations; historic events and places; and individuals. (A person must be dead for at least 20 years is one requirement for an individual). But it also has an “other” category that leaves the door narrowly open for proposed honorees that have had “an extraordinary and highly acclaimed accomplishment or involvement for the public good linked to [Community Board 1] and the location proposed for the co-naming.”

Downing vigorously argued that De Niro fits that exception.

“Everything seems to align with that fourth category that you all created,” he said.

“That was meant to be a very seldomly used exception that was meant to answer people’s concerns that we were going to stop extraordinary cases from getting through,” responded committee member Jess Coleman. “We wanted to retain our ability to have discretion.”

“It would tear up these rules that we made here,” he added. 

“I actually feel that this is extraordinary so I don’t feel that it would be throwing out all of our hard work,” Detta Ahl, another committee member, argued. “I still think it is a very high bar to reach.” 

CB1’s latest effort to clarify its street co-naming guidelines came after the committee turned down, in January, 2022, an application to honor the late Harold Lui, who was instrumental in the founding of the Chinese Planning Council and what is today’s Charles B. Wang Chinatown Health Center. 

Previously, the board formed a street co-naming working group after an emotionally charged debate and eventual rejection [1], in October 2018, of a street co-naming for Staff Sgt. Jimmy McNaughton, 27, the first NYPD officer killed in Iraq and a former transit cop who had been based in Tribeca. Some on the board cited its earlier rejection of a street co-naming for David Ruggles, the African American publisher and abolitionist who lived on Lispenard Street and gave support to hundreds of runaway slaves, including Frederick Douglas.

“I would be very uncomfortable to say no to Ruggles and yes to somebody else,” said board member Alice Blank. “It’s not consistent.” (The then Councilwoman Margaret Chin later overrided the board’s decision and the City Council approved the sign for McNaughton.) 

The committee did not take a formal vote on the De Niro street co-naming, but a straw poll showed it lacked support. CB1 chair Meltzer, who announced herself  “rabidly against co-namings for streets,” said “it is so precedent-setting I would campaign against it if it came before the full board.” She did, however, suggest she would be open to a sign that somehow included De Niro, but less prominently than the Tribeca Festival name. (Such a sign would be a challenge. The Department of Transportation limits the wording to 35 characters and spaces.)

David Speer, director of operations for Tribeca Enterprises, told the committee he would “pull back the application for the time being” and return next month with different wording.

Councilman Christopher Marte, whose backing is needed for the City Council to vote on the sign, had written an enthusiastic statement of support for “Robert De Niro Way.” Following the committe meeting, he told the Trib, “I’ll give a call to Tammy [Meltzer], see what her concerns are, and see if we can reach a compromise.”

De Niro’s spokesman, Stan Rosenfield, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.