Appellate Court Rules Against Atlantic Yards Opponents
Bruce Ratner wasted no time announcing his intention to plow ahead with the construction of the Atlantic Yards Arena in the wake of a Court of Appeals ruling in his favor. “This is really the last hurdle that we have and now we can do what our company does best and build an arena and…
Bruce Ratner wasted no time announcing his intention to plow ahead with the construction of the Atlantic Yards Arena in the wake of a Court of Appeals ruling in his favor. “This is really the last hurdle that we have and now we can do what our company does best and build an arena and houses,” said Ratner on Friday, hours after the Appellate Division of State Supreme Court rejected Goldstein et al’s position that the state improperly used eminent domain to seize properties from nine owners who did not want to sell. If Ratner does indeed move ahead with plans to build, the arena the public gets may be substantially different than the glitzy renderings from starchitect Frank Gehry that were used to build public support for the project early on: Ratner has already trimmed the budget for the project by 20 percent and has admitted that he may not use Gehry’s design at all. And Ratner can’t get going quite yet. The plaintiffs have vowed to appeal to the Court of Appeals (the highest court in the state) and there’s still pending litigation surrounding the state’s environmental impact study. “At a minimum, if we lose every single thing imaginable, it’s still going to take them four to six months,” said attorney Matthew Brinckerhoff. The delay is particularly important because Forest City Ratner has only until the end of the year to secure its tax-exempt financing for the arena from the state.
Eminent Domain Case is Dismissed Unanimously [AY Report]
Court Rebuffs Yards Opponents as Legal Options Narrow [NY Observer]
Ruling Puts Ratner Closer to Nets’ Arena [Newsday]
Appeals Court Dismisses Suit Against Atlantic Yards [NY Times]
Ruling Could put Atlantic Yards Project Back on Track [NY Daily News]
> “now brooklyn is out a gehry.”
No tears shed there. Like we really needed a leaky, trendy POS from Gehry to legitimize us as a city.
Regardless of whether you are for or against AY as proposed, anyone with half a brain could have predicted a protracted legal battle. Between the eminent domain, the scale and density, the lack of public process, the massive subsidies, and the fact that it would be sandwiched between two relatively affluent brownstone neighborhoods, a legal battle was inevitable. Should have been part of the business plan.
While DIBS’s point is well-taken that any sizeable development is going to have some opposition, I alse agree with Bob Marvin that size matters. The opposition would have been more marginal and less intense than there would have been for something more in keeping with the adjacent neighborhoods. I suspect that, even today, if AY were scaled back to have less demapping, less intensity and more neighborhood scale developent, opposition would ease.
So, MM- you don’t want AY? 🙂
the anti crowd pits a real developer against a dream/a fantasy. there is no ready to roll alternative. that area has sucked for years! it’s awful. i lived near there. who are you fooling? it’s ghetto and train tracks. the anti people messed up by prolonging the building, and now brooklyn is out a gehry. having the stadium there is thrilling. it’s the damn city. it can be big and crowded and tall.
this is how things get done. ratner’s years of making money and connections and ambitions have gotten him here. he’s powerful. it’s going to take a powerful person to move mta train tracks and urban blight and turn it into a stadium and apartments. all the effort to stop this guys could have been used to do something productive in the first place. reactive energy is wasted energy. the anti people have all the time in the world to complain and fight but never had enough time to do something new and creative. positive leadership of deeds is the strongest way to change things.
also, if you want low rise living as a guarantee, then you need to move somewhere where development isn’t possible.
And I add a big black church style “Preach it, brothers and sisters” to all of the anti Ratner remarks above.
Why opposed:
Horrendous back room deal
No thought to infrastructure
Not one iota of sense in traffic planning
Shoulda been illegal sale of land by MTA to FCR
Bad design
Race baiting campaign
Tax payer nightmare
Campaign to sell Nets to Brooklyn ala return of Dodgers
Use of eminent domain by private developer
Etc, etc
Thank you Colonel Steve! So true.
This actually makes me a little sick to my stomach, so I won’t comment much, but I am opposed to this project from every conceivable angle.
To put aside for a moment, if possible given how outrageous, the billions in tax money subsidizing this horrid man’s “vision” which has bulldozed forward despite valid community protest and conflicting visions, does anyone actually want an ARENA in this spot? The hellacious traffic, the crowds, the look of it? The loss of such enormous potential…really? THIS is what Brooklyn wants on this spot – the crossroads into the borough? I just don’t get it.
Add my amen to snappy’s too!
Colonel Steve Austin, the choir says amen!
Instead of lawyering, opponents need to get political and direct their sights at Gov Paterson. Make him politically responsible for AY. The city and state are bleeding money right now and we’re still subsidizing corporations?
As the city and state are looking at ways to shore up their deficits, how about starting with NOT giving away $2 billion in Taxpayer dollars to a wealthy real estate developer.
Instead of the the MTA jacking fares and cutting services, how about they NOT ‘giving away’ a prime piece of BK real estate. How much of their shortfall could be covered if they were getting Fair Market Value for the site?