It was a restaurant where F. Scott Fitzgerald had a tryst with a woman in a booth — supposedly. It was a bar with front steps that were built expressly to trip up Prohibition-era policemen who would periodically rush in to spoil the party — maybe. And it had bootlegging tunnels that led from inside the bar far out into the street — probably not.

This particular Greenwich Village haunt is clad in decades of lore, and it can sometimes be difficult to paw through the embellishment or outright fiction. But some things are known for certain: it was a beloved literary hangout and a storied old place called Chumley’s, which opened as a speakeasy in the 1920s and was forced to close its doors in 2007 when the facade of its building tumbled in the street along with pieces of an adjoining building.

After more than five years, the Department of Buildings has declared that the building, 86 Bedford Street — the last of five structures involved in the collapse to be rebuilt — is structurally sound, and the department has passed responsibility for the parcel from its forensic engineering unit, which oversees the most dangerous and difficult projects, to the divisions that oversee standard construction sites as the owner finishes the inside.

“This was one of the most difficult jobs I’ve done, and I do this all the time,” said Timothy Lynch, the executive director of the forensic unit.