ESDC Seeks Final Evictions Today
And then there was one. It was widely reported earlier this week that Freddy’s Bar, the long-time gathering place of Atlantic Yards opponents, had made plans to relocate at the end of this month. And now, with the ESDC set to formally request eviction orders from a Brooklyn Supreme Court judge today, The Brooklyn Paper…
And then there was one. It was widely reported earlier this week that Freddy’s Bar, the long-time gathering place of Atlantic Yards opponents, had made plans to relocate at the end of this month. And now, with the ESDC set to formally request eviction orders from a Brooklyn Supreme Court judge today, The Brooklyn Paper is reporting that all of the remaining residential hold-outs except for one have cut deals to relocate. We have successfully worked to find comparable or better housing for every family in the footprint except one, said Forest City’s MaryAnne Gilmartin. Not surprisingly, the last man standing is Daniel Goldstein the founder and face of Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn. Based on a post on Atlantic Yards Report, however, his recalcitrance could have more to do with practicality than principle at this point: He’s still being low-balled on the value of his own apartment ($395 per square foot compared to a market average of $475 in Prospect Heights) and has only been offered apartments in two buildings so far. The final screwing in a screwed up process.
Goldstein Now, Officially, the last Yards Holdout [Brooklyn Paper]
ESDC Suggests Comparable Condos [Atlantic Yards Report]
Curtain to Fall on Last Atlantic Yards Holdouts [Crain’s]
Freddy’s Finds Amnesty in Park Slope [Brownstoner]
The 3M will add that decade back pretty quickly.
$3 million is a lotta money. But the past few years probably shaved a decade off Goldstein’s life. If I were him, I’d take the $$$ and move out of NYC altogether.
Wow, six years of preaching and pontificating, but when Ratner waves the $ in Goldstein’s face, the self-appointed savior of Prospect Heights rolls over. As I suspected, he was in it for the money all along. We can now include him in the ranks of “wealthy white masters”.
And, folks, don’t believe for one second that this payment hurt Ratner. To him, $3 million is like a dollar to us unwashed mortals.
Be_rude;
Excellent summation.
Those who supported DG and DDB, I would urge you to think about what has been gained for your movement.
To me, one of the ironic parts of this whole issue is this: while DDDB and their ilk were supposedly fighting the good fight against ED abuse, something like 36 states have actually enacted laws tightening up their ED procedures in the wake of the Kelo decision. In NY, however, nothing has been accomplished in this regard. Nor is their any serious movement underway to do so.
Unlike other seminal events in the history of this city (say, for instance, the destruction of the old Penn Station), this event will lead to no new movement. And for that, you can thank the now-rich egomaniac, Dan Goldstein.
I really can’t understand all the anger at Goldstein. Just because he (and many others) did not want the stadium near them does not mean that eminent domain was not a primary issue for them.
The original Gehry design was hideous. We are truly lucky that a substitute design will take its place. Truly, if Gehry’s name had not been on the original stadium and apartment plans, people would have laughed at how disgusting they were, worthy only of an architecture school dropout. “Starchitect” my ass! The original designs for AY make Ratner’s Atlantic Center buildings look like the height of good taste. As bad as a huge parking lot will be, it will still be more attractive than the mass of crap that was planned. In all likelihood, though, now that we the taxpayers have contributed hundreds of millions to the project and enabled the Rat to get additional hundreds of millions from Barclay, he will probably eventually sell off a large part of the ED property to other developers at a handsome profit.
So what if Goldstein got 3 million for his apartment. He fought hard and that’s the way things go in the world of high finance. The ones we should really feel sorry for are the people living in Newswalk (and all the area brownstones) who will get to “enjoy” blasting, debris, poor air quality, and limited views from anywhere in their building for a couple of decades.
Our politicians (Emperor Bloomberg, the dancing chimp in Brooklyn Borough Hall, Patterson, and Shelly Silver, as well as lots of other smaller fry) are truly worthless. With one breath, they complained of budget shortfalls and with the other, they gave away hundreds of millions of dollars to a billionaire, money that we and our children will be paying back for decades in higher taxes. AY will never be a money maker for Brooklyn.
The expensive holdout is one of the precise reasons for eminent domain. Which way does the irony cut here?
Pretty sad that he supposedly fought on behalf of the community but when the price was right, he took it and ran away. Too bad for all the other people that supported him as they were all fooled by the real objective of his fight. Now I wouldn’t be surprised to see him become actively involved in promoting this place 🙂
Anyways, good for him and good for the area – I just think this project was delayed and delayed for no useful reason.
“Now that the fight is over, though, please stop lauding the man … he never cared about the gov’t abuses he paid so much lip service to — and you’ll likely never hear him fight these abuses again — he just didn’t want to move.”
Amazing indeed. In short order after I posted that at 3:02, news breaks completely supporting that argument.
What’s more, it’s not even _unlikely_ we’ll ever hear DG fight these abuses again, it’s basically _guaranteed_ he won’t by the gag order he just sold his “principles” out for. Aren’t those of you who actually care about the “good fight” bothered at all that he’s made a complete mockery of your values?
As to Ratner, sure, DG made him look bad. But did he really look that good before?? I don’t think anyone in the pro-AY camp really cares how Ratner came off, they just want something built over the gaping hole in the middle of BK. And Ratner isn’t even going to notice $3mil (and, as has been pointed out earlier, DGs delay likely helped Ratner from getting bogged down in the midst of constructing a huge project during the Great Recession saving him countless millions…). So, um, yeah, hats off to DG for making a developer look bad, delaying and thus watering down what could have been a good design, fleecing a bunch of well-meaning folks into believing he actually cared about their worthy causes, then taking a fat payoff at the end.
In sum, Bruce has his deal, Brooklyn sports fans get an arena, DG has a $2 mil profit … and the rest of DDDB and their backers have what exactly??
For the record- DG is not a hero. He’s a feisty guy but i don’t use the word hero easily. That said, more power to him.