George Will on Atlantic Yard's 'Cognitive Dissonance'
“The Atlantic Yards site, where 10 subway lines and one railway line converge, is the center of the bustling Prospect Heights neighborhood of mostly small businesses and middle-class residences. Its energy and gentrification are reasons why 22 acres of this area — the World Trade Center site is only 16 acres — are coveted by…
“The Atlantic Yards site, where 10 subway lines and one railway line converge, is the center of the bustling Prospect Heights neighborhood of mostly small businesses and middle-class residences. Its energy and gentrification are reasons why 22 acres of this area — the World Trade Center site is only 16 acres — are coveted by Bruce Ratner, a politically connected developer collaborating with the avaricious city and state governments. To seize the acres for Ratner’s use, government must claim that the area — which is desirable because it is vibrant — is “blighted.” The cognitive dissonance would embarrass Ratner and his collaborating politicians, had their cupidity not extinguished their sense of the absurd.” — George Will in The Washington Post
“Schultz, Conservatives don’t like the abuse of individual property rights.”
Only individual rights like reproduction
blowfish – are you literate? I said that Will’s argument is undermined and discredited because he said it was he CENTER of PH – which it clearly is not.
And YOUR arguments are totally discredited when you make stupid statements like “Dan Goldstein is middle class” – the guy bought a $600,000 apartment at 33yars old….if you knew anything about the guy you’d know he was a trustfunder from Westchester whose father runs a very successful Hedge Fund.
The full article is very well written, and contains a definiton of the Atlantic Yards variation of “blight” that I want to remember … ” that term, untethered from serious social dangers, has become elastic in the service of avarice.”
Schultz, Conservatives don’t like the abuse of individual property rights.
Posted by: jessibaby at January 5, 2010 10:27 AM
Rand Paul for Senate 2010!
> fatuous, hypocritical grotesque
Another one for the taxonomy.
It is and was BLIGHTED – and has been for the better part of a century….
what do you think “blight” means?????
The Common (non-plant) definition is:
Something that impairs growth, withers hopes and ambitions, or impedes progress and prosperity.
and the legal precedent definition:
Condemnation to eliminate areas of intangible physical blight, that is, areas which tend to create slums OR WHICH TEND TO IMPAIR OR ARREST SOUND GROWTH of the city, is a public purpose, redevelopment may properly be accomplished by private person, and area condemned may thereafter be properly used for nonresidential purposes, and power thus exercised comes within provisions of Section 1 of Article XVIII of Constitution of State of New York even though area is not slum with tangible physical blight. (Cannata v New York (1961, 2d Dept) 14 AD2d, 221 NYS2d 457.)
It doesnt mean that it is a “slum” or that every building is abandoned or falling down – it means that it impairs growth – and if you seriously argue that AY has not impaired growth in the area (a central location in Brooklyn) then you are being willfully blind…. now you may argue that the Ratner AY site is too large and takes in parts that were not “blighted”, you’d have a legitimate argument(although not convincing to me given the economic realities) but to try to claim as Will (and you are) that the bulk of the AY site is/was a vibrant community is just ridiculous.
As for the “Alternative” – besides the fact that there was no feasible one available (Extell was not capable of the job and is now facing receivership on some of its other projects) – smaller projects are not appropriate next to/on top of such a major transportation hub.
excuse me, desirable? to whom?? it’s empty train tracks, threatening teenagers, ugly low income housing and deserted waste land. area s*cks now.
way to comment on something you don’t understand george!
it is blighted!
jeez
idiots
FRSG you are always so full of it. Your argument is so weak I can’t believe you went thru the effort of typing it. Are you seriously trying to say Will’s argument is undermined, maybe even totally discredited by the fact that he called the area Prospect Heights? And middle class? Benson/Legion, care to weigh in again about how there is no poverty here? Seriously, though, not that the name of the nabe remotely matters, bu the AY site does border on Prosepct Heights, I have friends that live right up against it in PH, and their neighborhood is/was necidely not empty. They are squarely in the class. DG is also in the middle class, and arguably anyone that’s not in the top 1% is in the middle class, because there’s such a big gap between them and everyone else. Yeah, I personally wish that Gehry’s design was built already, but that doesn’t erase the inconvenient truth that the area was not blighted
Was Atlantic Yards less “blighty” before 2007? I never saw it before then, but have seen it pretty much every week since then.
“Blight” seems a fairly apt description of the immediate area.
When you get a few blocks away, you quickly get into nicer areas, but the crossing of Flatbush/Atlantic/5th Ave and associated blocks is a pretty sad sight — not anything I would call “mostly small businesses and middle-class residences”.
And, yeah — it ain’t the “center” of prospect heights. It’s the “fringe” of 4 neighborhoods.
Not that this means that what is being done there is “right”, but something certainly needed to be done there.