Sandy couldn’t stop them — but their landlord can.
Several carnival-style booths and other businesses in Coney Island were slapped with eviction notices yesterday just as their owners were finished cleaning up the mess from Hurricane Sandy.
“There’s no more room for ma and pa — it’s going to big corporations,” said Jeff Brooks, 58, among the operators on Bowery between West 12th Street and Jones Walk. Four tenants operate the carnival-style booths, which include two water-gun racing games, darts, a fish bowl ping-pong, along with a restaurant and a warehouse that was once a popular arcade.
Their rents ranged from $12,000 to $35,000 per season, which runs from April through October.
“This is nothing other than tenants being a huge pain in our a–,” insisted landlord Matt Weinberg, who said the booted businesses are frequently late with their rent.
“This is not about . . . replacing them with Starbucks,” Weinberg said. “This is about replacing them with other mom-and- pop amusement operators who happen to tender their rent in a timely fashion.”
Additional reporting by Gary Buiso