Photos: B2 tower rises, though facade problems remain; arena green roof has odd gaps

Photo: Wayne Bailey

The B2 modular tower (aka 461 Dean Street), shown at right in a photo this weekend from resident/activist Wayne Bailey, looks to be about five or six stories short of completion, with only the center section modules needed to be added.

See below for renderings of completed building, which is supposed to be 322 feet.

Presumably, if the factory at the Navy Yard shuts down or is sold at the end of February--a possibility to which workers were alerted--or shortly afterward, the modules will have been finished.

Photo: Wayne Bailey

One lingering problem, as the photo above right indicates if you click to enlarge or if you look at the excerpt at left (from a photo taken a few days earlier), is that pieces of the facade, especially in the foreground section, remain insecure.

That means that the exterior repair work must be done, as it has been, on numerous modules that were supposed to be delivered plug-and-play.

We don't know much about a potentially more serious issue: interior repair work, which was required on early modules after water penetration and mold, and which continues, for unspecified reasons.

Another issue hinted at in the top photo, and still unresolved, is when and whether the Barclays Center green roof will be finished--it was supposed to be done last July, then September--or whether the incomplete patchwork of sedum is as good as it will get.

Renderings from SHoP

Trying to keep track

While B2 appears to be at about the 26th or 27th floor, the bi-weekly Construction Updates prepared by Greenland Forest City Partners and distributed by Empire State Development, the state authority overseeing/shepherding the project, have been rather opaque.

Module going up. Photo: Wayne Bailey

The last update to mention a specific floor was the dated October 26 ad November 2, 2015, which stated "Module erection for floor 23 will be completed this period."

The most recent update, for last week and this week, states:

Work related to the erection of modules shall continue.
Interior work will continue on modules that have already been installed.
Exterior façade adjustments and paint repairs ongoing.

In other words, the building needs work before it opens in the third or fourth quarter of this year. But my queries to ESD about progress regarding B2 and the green roof went unanswered.

Progress since last April

After an eight-month stall, work on B2 starting on the 11the floor resumed last April, after Forest City Ratner took over the modular factory in the Brooklyn Navy Yard from former joint venture partner Skanska, and replaced Skanska as construction manager at the B2 site with Turner Construction.

The photos below, taken month by the Atlantic Yards web cam, show B2 rising steadily, if not consistently so--the progress over the last four months seems more modest, through that may be related to 1) weather and 2) less noticeable repair work.

It is notable how the green roof seemed mostly done by last June, though significant patches of uncovered metal remain~~, and they have not declared it finished.~~

Update 2/24/16: A Forest City Ratner spokeswoman says, indeed, the green roof has been finished for a while.