A Look Back at the Atlantic Yards Groundbreaking
Flickr photog AKinloch snapped this photo on Tuesday of the first day of demolition at the Atlantic Yards. We’re going to stop by this weekend to check out the site for ourselves. Please send us pics if you do the same. Update: A federal magistrate judge has recommended that the lawsuit against Ratner, Bloomberg, Pataki…
Flickr photog AKinloch snapped this photo on Tuesday of the first day of demolition at the Atlantic Yards. We’re going to stop by this weekend to check out the site for ourselves. Please send us pics if you do the same. Update: A federal magistrate judge has recommended that the lawsuit against Ratner, Bloomberg, Pataki et al. stay in State Court. See the different spins on the links below.
Magistrate Says ED Case Belongs in State Court [AY Report]
Judge Urges Dismissal of Atlantic Yards Suit [NY Times]
Proof That The AY Demo Did Indeed Begin [Brownstoner]
Anonymous,
Sadly it is you who are misinformed.
“little public benefit” = thousands of low and middle income apartments, thousands of jobs and an area means a lot for Brooklyn.
“No park” – you mean the 8 acres of public park space?
“a handful of apartments for low income tenants” = you mean the 2,250 rental units and hundreds of ownership units is a just a “handful”? How many have you built?
“22 acres of real estate is being developed” = 22 acres includes an open pit of a rail yards and bunch of run down auto body shops and warehouses. ..the place has been a hole for decades.
“the community has had absolutely nothing to say about it” = there has been over 3 years of debate about this stupid thing. the “community”, who i suppose you mean opponents and not the thousands of supporters, has voiced their opinions in spades. it’s not that you don’t have a voice, it’s that you are wrong and a majority of Brooklynites flatly disagree with you.
“those community groups that Ratner either created out of whole cloth or bribed” – this is where the opponents really come up short. Rather than admit that there are very decent people trying to ensure really positive aspects of Atlantic Yards, you all attack them. I know some of them and they work damn hard to provide real services for this community. Your attacks are pathetic. Your king and leader Mr. Goldstein hires his girlfriend and you don’t say a peep. hypocritical maybe?
so go ahead, call me paid off , call me on ratner’s pay role, call me whatever you want. the truth is there are thousands, if not millions, of people who can not wait for this project for very good reasons, and unlike most of the opponents they are not self serving reasons. in my humble opinion it’s time to drop some of the vitriol if this debate and make sure this thing brings as much good as it can.
Public money is being siphoned to Ratner’s development and no one has yet to explain why. The constuction, traffic and pollution will have a significant detrimental effect to the entire area.
No one ever said that area wouldn’t benefit from development. But the Ratner plan is the result of some disgusting political chicanery. Just like tax cuts for millionaires, there’s SOME economic benefit, but at a price that is vastly greater than the benefit. Hence Ratner’s need to control the debate through a multiude of PR companies and fake neighborhood associations.
Downtown Brooklyn businesses may benefit slightly in the long run – but the borough will suffer and Ratner will profit. With a lot of help from our tax dollars.
as long as CCGH and Puca are against it – I am for it
SuperAnon — you are very poorly informed. This is a boondoggle — massive public subsidies with little public benefit. What are we going to get for all the PUBLIC money that is going to be poured into Atlantic Yards? No park, a lot of traffic, a handful of apartments for low income tenants relative to the thousands of market rate apartments (the latter of which could have been built without public subsidies), an “interim” open air parking lot for a thousand vehicles and a construction time frame that’s likely to extend to two decades. These buildings are going to tower over and overwhelm the existing neighborhoods on all sides and they will do nothing to knit together Prospect Heights and Fort Greene in the way that a better designed project could. 22 acres of real estate is being developed and yet the community has had absolutely nothing to say about it. There’s is an existing land use process that was circumvented in order to push this thing through without consulting any of us who live in this borough — except those community groups that Ratner either created out of whole cloth or bribed.
People like you act as if the choice is between no development or AY style development. In fact, there are other models. Those of us who are anti-AY, and for whom this is a sad day indeed, are not against development. We’d just like our development to be smarter and more democratic.
This project is not a good deal for Brooklyn, and the worst part is the devious way in which Ratner is using our politicians for his personal gain. Ratner is ripping off the people of Brooklyn and Bloomberg, Pataki et al. are helping him. Sorry folks but this is a DUMB DEAL!
Yes, it is the end of the story. Recommendations from magistrates are always accepted and a condemnation proceeding, once begun in NYS, is highly unlikely to be stopped. Technically, this is still alive, but in reality, it’s over.
State courts are not lower than federal courts. They’re totally different sets of courts.
Note, this is just the federal law suit, which was filed before the State -I guess they thought they could skip the lower courts. Note the magistrate – who is not the judge, says that “there is a real dispute between the parties.” So this is not the end of the story.
you mean this lawsuit?
Legal Blow To Critics Of Atlantic Yards Project
Last Edited: Friday, 23 Feb 2007, 5:04 PM EST
Created: Friday, 23 Feb 2007, 5:04 PM EST
By TOM HAYS
Associated Press Writer
NEW YORK — A federal magistrate on Friday recommended tossing out a lawsuit meant to block developer Bruce Ratner’s Atlantic Yards project — dealing a blow to a group of Brooklyn property owners and tenants facing eviction.
While a U.S. district judge still has final say on whether the suit survives, the odds are long: magistrates’ recommendations are rarely rejected.
The suit, filed in federal court last year, charges that seizure of the plaintiff’s property under eminent domain would be unconstitutional.
U.S. Magistrate Robert M. Levy concluded in court papers filed Friday that “there is a real dispute between the parties.” But also found that the federal court should abstain from entering the fray because it’s a local matter.
“This action represents important public policy concerns and is essentially local in nature,” he wrote. “Because the state’s interest in adjudicating this case in its own forum outweighs the federal interest in retaining jurisdiction, I respectfully recommend that this court abstain … and dismiss plaintiff’s complaint.”
Calls to attorneys on both sides and to a spokeswoman for Ratner were not immediately returned.
The suit identifies the defendants as Ratner, Gov. George Pataki, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff and Empire State Development Corp. Chairman Charles Gargano, among others. It seeks to permanently block the defendants from seizing the property, and asks for unspecified compensatory and punitive damages.
Atlantic Yards is a $4 billion megadevelopment of 16 skyscrapers and an arena planned by Ratner, the principal owner of the New Jersey Nets.