Atlantic Yards Signed, Sealed, Delivered
It feels kinda anti-climactic, but after six years of public conflict, lack of transparency and backroom dealing, the Atlantic Yards deal has closed. This means that the both the bond deal and the real estate transaction involving Forest City, ESDC, the MTA and the City of New York have been signed. Curbed has posted a…
It feels kinda anti-climactic, but after six years of public conflict, lack of transparency and backroom dealing, the Atlantic Yards deal has closed. This means that the both the bond deal and the real estate transaction involving Forest City, ESDC, the MTA and the City of New York have been signed. Curbed has posted a full-length version of the press release, but here’s what Bruce himself had to say: Today, what has long been a vision for the future of Brooklyn becomes a reality. Six years after we announced our plan for Atlantic Yards we are very pleased to be closing on the project with our public partners. Today’s closing represents a vital step forward for New York City, one that is all the more important because of the economic challenges our City faces. The jobs we are creating today, as we set forth on the arena and one of the boldest affordable housing initiatives in our City’s history, will create a new dynamic center in this wonderful borough. We’re sure others will have some choice words on the subject in the upcoming hours and days.
Since I just arrived in Brooklyn in 2007, the Decade of Brooklyn has another 8 years to go!!
FGC — That’s a developer’s idea of a decade of Brooklyn. I’d say that a year in which I managed to play mini-golf with my family on a vacant lot in the industrial fringe of Bushwick on a course designed by nine cutting-edge design firms which we followed with a delicious meal next door, regularly hear excellent jazz in a tiny storefront on 5th Ave south of 9th Street, and have had several fabulous meals in Red Hook, all quite unthinkable a decade ago, I’d say Brooklyn’s had quite a decade. When I wonder about what wonderful and odd things that might happen next to make Brooklyn better, large-scale residential and commercial development isn’t one of them.
Not to be a downer, but I’d say we just finished the Decade of Brooklyn. The next decade will belong to some other place, probably Beijing.
I’m not sure that 20 years of surface parking next to an arena counts as a big jobs generator, and certainly the consensus is that sports arenas are _not_ beneficial to the communities where they are located, no matter how hard some might wish for that to be the case. Certainly taxpayers are losers in this particular deal. And you realize that with the approval of the GPP, most of the basic urban design and zoning decisions about the site have been delegated to the developer. With FCR’s dismal record of developing public places and spaces, I am not optimistic about the quality of the public spaces that will be a part of the development.
Still, moving into construction is just the first step, and hopefully time and constant efforts will bring improvements to what is eventually designed and built.
> “one of the boldest affordable housing initiatives in our City’s history…”
The only thing bold is that statement. Isn’t the affordable housing component on indefinite hold?
The deal is not far from done. True, still not 100%, but really not far from it.
Don’t (continute to) propogate the false hopes of the haters. One thing that _is_ far from happening is the lawsuits actually winning.
There are actually two lawsuits pending, and this deal is far from done — Ratner has been obliged to place all funds in escrow until they are sorted out.
Looking forward to the Yards, brooklyn needs it.
Meh…not so much. I think that the 20-aughts set the foundation for the future (rezoning of Downtown Brooklyn, rezoning of Williamsburg Waterfront, approval of AY, commencement of Brooklyn Bridge Park, the expansion of BAM and (maybe most importantly) the establishment of the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership) but the 20-teens is when we will start to see the tangible fruits of all of that labor.