Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park Report

Updated: Forest City, according to the Plain Dealer, called Ratner's filing too late and charged he was trying to game the system. A judge denied the request to delay the vote, saying Ratner couldn't prove irreparable harm.

Citing “materially inaccurate information and omission of material facts” in the proxy statement produced for shareholders to evaluate the pending acquisition by Brookfield Asset Management, former Forest City Enterprises (now Forest City Realty Trust) CEO and co-Chairman Albert Ratner two days ago filed suit in federal court to postpone the special meeting of shareholders set for tomorrow, 11/15/18.

His goal: a more honest proxy statement regarding the firm’s potential value and the process behind the sale. (See press release, suit, and proxy statement at bottom.)

Ratner, building on themes expressed in three previous press releases, argues, more pointedly than before, that the sale, endorsed by Forest City’s board majority after a narrow 7-5 vote that fe…

Tonight's Atlantic Yards Quality of Life meeting--with a vague agenda and not much new since the previous meeting just five weeks earlier--is probably not the biggest meeting at that hour for public officials like Assemblyman Walter Mosley, Council Member (um, Majority Leader) Laurie Cumbo, and Rep. Yvette Clarke, and their staffers.

They'll be at a Crown Heights Development Town Hall from 6-9 pm, at Full Gospel Assembly at 131 Sullivan Place to discuss five major developments in the southern part of the neighborhood, including two near the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, and the Bedford Union Armory.

That out-of-service elevator at the Barclays plaza

That said, there is one piece of news that deserves some discussion tonight. Yesterday, the TransitCenter, a nonprofit organization concerned with--duh--transit, announced The El-Evaders, stating that "eight of New York City’s wealthiest real estate owners are shirking their legal obligation to maintain and operate their subway stat…

Two advisory firms have given shareholders the green light to sell shares in Forest City Realty Trust (FCRT) and thus approve the pending sale to Brookfield Asset Management, which was advanced by FCRT's board in a contentious 7-5 vote and has faced both board dissent and forceful criticism from a former co-chair and CEO.

Those advisors, one of them clearly lacking full-throated enthusiasm, could give institutional shareholders like the Vanguard Group backup for a "yes" vote on the merger. It's reminiscent, in an unrelated but not irrelevant context, of the minimal "rational basis" standard required for judges in New York State to uphold the actions of a state agency.

The special stockholder meeting to vote on the transaction is Thursday, Nov. 15, in the offices of the law firm LLP, in Cleveland, where Forest City is based. Even if the acquisition is approved, the deal won't close until the end of the year.

Ratner: a bad deal

That former CEO, Albert Ratn…

There was a time when WFAN host Craig Carton of the show "Boomer & Carton" was one of the most prominent skeptics of the Nets' move to Brooklyn. But that came before the high-paid Carton made his own deals with the Barclays Center, then misappropriated investors' money to pay off gambling debt, and then lost his job and now his freedom.

Let's recap. As I wrote in December 2008, Carton had a scrappy interchange with Brett Yormark, then CEO of the New Jersey Nets, who was promising a move soon to Brooklyn.

While, in retrospect, Carton was wrong in asserting, "You're not moving to Brooklyn," he did get Yormark to say he was "convinced" that the Nets would be in Brooklyn "for the 11-12 season." At the time, I wrote that 2012 was a more realistic best-case scenario, and that's how it turned out.

When Carton suggested the Nets move to the Prudential Center in Newark in the interim, Yormark pooh-pooh'ed that, saying the Nets…

A former garment factory and warehouse in Sunset Park, at 3rd Avenue and 39th Street, has been dubbed "Sunset Yards" by its new owners, who are thus pursuing "floor-to-ceiling renovations... modern industrial-style finishes and state-of-the-art infrastructure," according to the web site.

States the owner:
Uniquely positioned between the subway and the expressway, and standing adjacent to open rail yards, the building enjoys 360 degrees of unobstructed views and sits around the corner from Industry City’s six million square feet of retail, workspace, and amenities.In other words, what was once a sort of isolated building is in the thick of things. It certainly looks different from the visual in the building's digital brochure, pictured at left.

The "Yards"

Any project with the name "Yards" appended inevitably recalls Atlantic Yards, now Pacific Park, which came after the successful sports facility development in Baltimore called Camden Yards.

…

The latest Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park Construction Update (bottom), covering the two weeks beginning Monday, Nov. 12, 2018 was circulated at 3:41 pm Friday (lead time) by Empire State Development (ESD) after preparation by Greenland Forest City Partners.

There are few changes from the previous update, with the only truly new thing, as far as I can tell, outside the 550 Vanderbilt Avenue condo, aka B11:
● A boom lift and hanging scaffold will be used to complete minor exterior repairs during this reporting period.

Other work continues at the railyard and in tenant fit-out at two towers.
Also, the updates can be confusing, since they indicate--in red--work that's supposed to be new but actually was forecasted in the previous update, but perhaps never actually started. Such long-promised activity includes various work at the railyard:
● The demolition and removal of the existing Substation equipment and structures west of the 6th Avenue Bridge may begin during this reporting period.
…

OK, the agenda's out for the next Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park Quality of Life meeting, this Tuesday, Nov. 13.

And, as you can see at right, it's typically vague, announcing representatives of the three entities related to the project: Empire State Development, Atlantic Yards Community Development Corporation, and Greenland Forest City Partners.

As I wrote 10/27/18, this meeting is just five weeks after the previous such meeting.

The issues at the last meeting included the project timetable, project monitoring, and plans for specific towers, notably B4, aka 18 Sixth Avenue. It's hard to see what will be new, but perhaps there will be more details on some other towers.

The details:
Tuesday, November 13, 2018 @ 6:00 PM
Shirley A. Chisholm State Office Building
55 Hanson Place
1st Floor Conference Room
Brooklyn, NY 11217 Oh, and maybe we'll here more about the advisory Atlantic Yards Community Development Corporation (AY CDC), which is supposed to meet quarterly but still…

Two proposed mixed-use projects on Pacific Street in western Crown Heights, about three blocks east of of the eastern border of Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park, suggest how development is percolating on industrial blocks used for vehicle storage or light commercial functions. And they're not the only projects.

The locations are 1010 Pacific Street and 1050 Pacific Street, both of which are zoned for low-rise manufacturing and will require rezonings to allow for greater density and residential use.

At 1010 Pacific

11-Story Mixed Use Building Revealed At 1010 Pacific Street In Crown Heights, Brooklyn, NY YIMBY reported 10/29/18. The 11-story, 115-foot building would contain 128 apartments, 39 of them (25%) permanently affordable for low-income households, with incomes up to 60 percent of Area Median Income, or AMI.


The developer is AVO Construction; in October 2015, LLCs likely connected to AVO--they share the same address--paid $8.5 million for the site.

According to YIMBY, the building …