July 30, 2005, Brooklyn Papers — Brooklyn Bridge Park’s sponsor unveiled a double surprise Wednesday night, announcing that state officials had approved a draft plan for the 1.3-mile waterfront development — and that it would include 1,200 units of luxury housing. Previous estimates had put the number of high-end condos in the residential, commercial, and open space development at anywhere from 700 to just over 900.

Critics have complained since a reworked Brooklyn Bridge Park plan was released late last year that planners have strayed from one of the founding principles intended to guide development of the 80 acre site — that there be no private housing developments. But what shocked them even more about this week’s announcement from the Empire State Development Corp., was that nearly 80 percent of the housing, some 940 units, would be concentrated on the southern tip of the park west of Furman Street between Joralemon Street and Atlantic Avenue.

BB Park to House 1,200 Condos [Brooklyn Papers]