After ten years, business-friendly Crain's suggests "development around the Barclays Center is on solid ground." Really? Keep your eye on the ball.

OK, I'm a little late at responding to the 11/3/22 Crain's New York business article As Barclays Center turns 10, a look at a neighborhood reinvented.

After all, it was paywalled, so it didn't generate much discussion, so far as I can tell.

And it's difficult to assess the arena's very mixed legacy in a relatively short space. 

Given that Crain's is a business publication, it's not surprising that the coverage, though not fully rah-rah, would tilt positive. Consider: the summary on Facebook was The Nets may be off to a shaky start this season, but development around the Barclays Center is on solid ground.

Around the arena?

The depends on what "development around the Barclays Center" means.

After all, the most consequential building "around" the arena was never built: the flagship tower, which original architect Frank Gehry dubbed "Miss Brooklyn," was supposed to loom over the arena at Flatbush and Atlantic avenues, but was replaced by the "temporary" (but surely permanent) plaza.

Even more importantly, the most consequential part of the Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park buildout--the two-block platform over the MTA's Vanderbilt Yard, the six large towers planned, and the majority of the open space--still awaits.

But has the arena helped--or, at least, not hindered--real estate development nearby? Sure, though it's not simple to tease the arena impact out of general trends.

Has the arena helped some retail outlets, notably those offering food and beverages? Sure, though again that's not simple, or uniform.

Leading off: a "huge bet"?

Let me go through the article paragraph by paragraph:

In the early 2000s, when plans for the Barclays Center were first unveiled, its supporters seemed to make a huge bet. The sports and entertainment venue could take a sleepy strip near Prospect Heights and turn it into one of Brooklyn's hottest neighborhoods.

After all, Frank Gehry, the center's architect at the time, had pulled off a similar feat in Bilbao, Spain, which went from a low-key city to a global draw with the addition of a shimmering Guggenheim museum.

Whether this was a "huge bet" is in question. After all, it was 4/18/99 when the New York Times profile of Prospect Heights was headlined A Diverse Neighborhood Spruces Up in a Turnaround. 

By the early 2000s, three industrial buildings within the project "footprint" had been renovated into modern apartments (condos, rentals), and a larger one, Newswalk, was nearby, within the missing "tooth" of the footprint.

The record shows, though, that this specific megaproject, given the impact of economic and political cycles, and the cost of building a platform over the railyard, was indeed a huge bet, forcing original developer Forest City Ratner to sell to Greenland USA.

The Gehry analogy seems off. The Bilbao Guggenheim was a one-off building, as was, say, Gehry's Disney Hall in Los Angeles. It was also part of a suite of public investments in Bilbao under others' control.

Atlantic Yards was remaking a 22-acre site with 17 buildings, including an arena, under the control of one developer, with the city and state offering a long leash.

"Not quite been fully realized"

From the article:

Barclays, which opened Sept. 21, 2012, has turned 10, but that vision has not quite been fully realized on some of the blocks surrounding the arena, which is wedged at the corner of Atlantic and Flatbush avenues. Indeed, only about half of the mixed-use megaproject around it, Pacific Park, for which the arena was to serve as an anchor, has been built.

That "not quite been fully" realized is an understatement. Though about half the approved units have been built, the project is not half-finished, given the need to deck the railyard and build six towers--plus, of course, Site 5, catercorner to the arena block and longtime home to two big-box stores, P.C. Richard and (now closed) Modell's.

"Changes that did occur"

From the article:

On the other hand, one doesn't have to look far to find dramatic examples of changes that did occur, including soaring apartment towers, trendy restaurants and new public spaces.

"There was a fear that Barclays would bleed over into the brownstone neighborhoods and take them over, like what's happened around Madison Square Garden," said Chris DeCrosta, founder of GoodSpace, a retail-focused real estate brokerage, and a local resident.

"But I'm pleasantly surprised by how well it has blended in," he said.

He's not wrong, but that's partly because the once-expected New Jersey Nets fans driving to Brooklyn never materialized, and the project has not been completed as an announced.

But those changes were unlocked most significantly not by the arena but by the Downtown Brooklyn rezoning.

New retail, but why?

From the article:

The 17,700-seat [for basketball, 17,732-N.O.] venue has clearly rearranged the retail landscape. Gone are many of the tax-preparers, thrift stores and chain restaurants of a decade ago. Now the area is awash in trendy restaurants such as eight-year-old Morgan's Brooklyn Barbecue, at 267 Flatbush, a space that once housed a law office, and year-old Tiny's Cantina, at No. 229, a one-time tattoo parlor. Both are owned by Glazierworks, which once operated Michael Jordan's white-tablecloth steakhouse in Grand Central.

"It's a totally different Flatbush than what people remember," said Penny Glazier, a partner at Glazierworks, which keeps both restaurants open past midnight when the Brooklyn Nets are playing, to lure post-game crowds. (The effort comes as the Nets, once based in New Jersey, are off to a shaky start. On Nov. 1, amid controversy over anti-Semitic posts by star Kyrie Irving, the Nets fired head coach Steve Nash and two days later suspended Irving indefinitely.) [Since then, both Irving and fellow star Kevin Durant have been traded.--N.O.]

Not every restaurant is capitalizing on proximity. Pecking House, which opened this fall at Flatbush and St. Mark's avenues, closes its doors at 10 p.m., before concertgoers spill out. But a rejuvenated streetscape, with brighter facades and more people on sidewalks, has created ancillary benefits all the same. "You can stand in front of our restaurant and see this great main artery of Brooklyn and realize the potential of this location," said chef and co-owner Eric Huang.

Yes, some restaurants and bars are aiming at arena crowds, but they wouldn't survive only on such crowds. The Flatbush Avenue location, as population and gentrification lapped closer, became more valuable.

The busiest Flatbush Avenue restaurants are Chik-fil-A and Shake Shack, right across from Barclays, and their volume has little to do with arena events.

Those, of course, are chain restaurants. I'm not sure what past chain restaurants they're referring to--Yummy Taco?

Rising retail rents, but...

From the article:

The transformation is not just about places to eat. Pop star Rihanna announced this year that she will open an outpost of her Savage X Fenty lingerie line at 182 Flatbush, a Barclays-facing building that has been empty for years. Developer Hidrock Properties bought the triangular site for $7 million in 2019, records show, after it traded seven years earlier for $4 million.

Overall, the area's average retail rent is now among Brooklyn's highest, or as much as $250 per square foot a year, DeCrosta said.

Another way of looking at it is that the Triangle Sports building, positioned directly across from the arena, has remained empty for a decade, and only if the Savage X Fenty buildout occurs--and we haven't seen much--will it be filled.

Other key retail space has either been abandoned or taken a long time to fill. The 461 Dean tower flanking the arena opened in 2016, but the first tenant, Just Salad, opened only this year.

The retail space on the Atlantic Avenue side of the arena open to the public with the arena in 2012, then soon closed. The retail space on the Flatbush Avenue side of the arena, once expected to have multiple tenants, cycled through several and now is devoted solely to the team store, plus additional entrances/egress to the arena.

Residential growth

From the article:

As the business mix shifts, high-rise apartment development has surged. Among the tall post-Barclays additions to the skyline is 300 Ashland, a 380-unit rental tower from Two Trees that welcomed tenants in 2016. Opening around the same time was the Hub, a 750-unit project at 333 Schermerhorn St. from Steiner NYC. And large-scale residential complexes continue to rise, such as 100 Flatbush, a phased 850-unit project from Alloy Development.

While the proximity to the arena certainly didn't deter construction, which some might have feared, I don't think it's mainly responsible for inducing it, though it surely had a somewhat larger effect on hotels. 

Downtown Brooklyn, with proximity to transportation and the BAM district, has become an advantageous place to build, compared with other options in the city. The 100 Flatbush project, with two towers and two schools, was a spot rezoning.

What about Atlantic Yards?

From the article:

But other developments, namely Pacific Park, remain incomplete.

A patchwork of sites next to rail yards between Atlantic and Dean Street, the 22-acre mixed-use Pacific Park is set to welcome two new rental towers this winter, Nos. 595 and 615 Dean. But even with their arrival, Pacific Park will still have delivered only eight of its promised 16 apartment buildings since the project was revealed more than a decade ago, or about 3,200 of 6,400 apartments. (Affordable, or below-market-rate, units account for about half of the completed total.)

The sites are, crucially, not "next to" rail yards but six must be built over the railyard, once the expensive deck is constructed.

Crain's is using a generous, though not inaccurate, definition of "affordable," but, as I've written, the affordability is way less than what was promised, with a disproportionate amount of units aimed at middle-class households, not the lower- and moderate-income tenants who marched for the project under the banner of ACORN.

What was the cause?

From the article:

The Great Recession may have taken a toll on the $6 billion project, originally known as Atlantic Yards. Early on developer Forest City Ratner abandoned the Barclays Center's Gehry design to go with a scaled-down, and less expensive, version from SHoP Architects instead. But Forest City, which relied on eminent domain to bulldoze residential and commercial buildings that officials declared "blighted," also faced lawsuits along the way.

Of course "blighted" in New York State is an infinitely malleable concept.

Beyond the recession and the lawsuits, another question must be confronted: was Atlantic Yards buildable as conceived? Or was Bruce Ratner floating a pipe dream?

Selling parcels?

From the article:

Today, Pacific Park is controlled by Chinese firm Greenland USA, though it has sold parcels to TF Cornerstone and other firms.

That kind of papers over the sales by Forest City, after losses. Actually, it sold development leases to parcels. The site is technically owned by the state, to enable various benefits.

A "Barclays bounce"?

From the article:

If some neighborhood blocks are works in progress, others appear to be enjoying a bit of a Barclays bounce, according to data prepared for Crain's by the listings site StreetEasy.

Between 2012 and 2022, apartments in the area near the arena, which includes parts of Prospect Heights and Park Slope, saw sale prices rise by an average of more than 6%, StreetEasy said. By contrast, prices in comparable Brooklyn neighborhoods rose 4% over the same period, according to the data. But StreetEasy analysts cautioned that developments near Barclays tend to be the luxury type, potentially skewing the data.

That bounce is hard to tease out, since the arena, of course, is near a major subway hub, which surely is another factor for future purchasers.

Plaza as legacy?

From the article:

Perhaps Barclays' most unexpected legacy, though, is its plaza. Forest City co-founder Bruce Ratner once said that the half-acre sweep would someday "become one of Brooklyn's great public spaces." But Ratner probably didn't anticipate the size of the crowds that would throng the site in the spring of 2020 to protest police brutality in the wake of George Floyd's killing.

The plaza was an accident, due to the failure to build "Miss Brooklyn" and deliver the promised jobs and tax revenues.

Of course the arena was, crucially, dormant at the time of the protests, and the plaza was "totally appropriated," according to one organizer.

A lame "gotcha"

The article closes with a lame "gotcha":

Even Daniel Goldstein, a fierce opponent of Pacific Park who sued to stop it several times and who ended up losing his home to the project, begrudgingly praised the rare bit of local open space two years ago in a Facebook post. "One silver lining," he said.

Well, note that Goldstein was commenting on, and responding to a 5/30/20 Deadspin article, Brutality at the Barclays Center — The Heart Of Brooklyn, which contained this passage:

Barclays Center represents a lot of what there’s been to be angry about in Brooklyn. But it’s also a central location to stage a community gathering that the borough of my youth didn’t have. It’s not something I ever thought about as part of the return of sports to Brooklyn, but it’s there now, even with the Nets not there for the foreseeable future.

Goldstein's full quote:

I knew, way back when, that the plaza at Barclays would come in handy as a central spot for protest in Brooklyn. One silver lining.

He went on to comment:

I also know that nobody living and working by the arena signed up to live in such a heavily policed neighborhood.

So, yeah, that's very limited praise for the plaza.

Crain's getting snarky

That wasn't the first time Crain's took a shot at Goldstein.

Back on 12/18/05, the Crain's Insider newsletter snarked that "One holdout could sink Brooklyn Nets plan," noting that, among remaining condo owners in the proposed project footprint, developer Forest City expected two to settle, but believed "Goldstein's family money enables him to make a stand on principle."

Though other condo owners did sell, Goldstein wasn't the only property owner who refused to sell and who filed suit to block eminent domain. And whether it was Goldstein's own savings or family support, since when is making a "stand on principle" something to deride?