Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park Report

For those wondering if developer Greenland Forest City Partners can meet the 2025 affordable housing deadline by building three "50% affordable" towers, as indicated in a state document I published yesterday --or even by building two towers, with one "100% affordable"--there's something important to remember. From the Development Agreement As I wrote in April 2019, the project's guiding Development Agreement --screenshot at right--simply defines affordable units as those "subject to income and rent restrictions" as part of a city or state regulatory agreement. Rents must be set at no more than 160% of Area Median Income (AMI) or, if higher, the highest percentage of AMI used in city or state housing programs. (So far, they've gone up to 165% of AMI.) Unmentioned was that a certain fraction must typically be low-income units for tax-code purposes. A middle-income skew From BrooklynSpeaks But that leaves room for a disproportion...

The developers of Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park, a newly disclosed document suggests, plan to build three 50% affordable towers over the first block of the railyard, thus potentially meeting the deadline to deliver 2,250 affordable units by the May 31, 2025 deadline. If so, Greenland Forest City Partners faces a significant challenge, given that the platform over that block, scheduled to start this year, could take three years . After that--assuming no construction could start until platform completion--GFCP (dominated by Greenland USA) would have less than two-and-a-half years to build three large towers, with a total of nearly 900 affordable units and the same number of market-rate ones. That's a lot of product. The buildout is possible--after all, this project is no stranger to overtime and weekend work--but not at all easy. That's why various observers, such as Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon, have expressed skepticism that the deadline can be met. And, perhaps, why G...

The new Sports Illustrated has, I guess, pseudonymous blog contributors, so on 12/30/19 we got Development of Sports Facilities Usually Regarded as a “Net Negative” for Local Municipalities, Multi-Use Arenas Can Be the Exception , from someone known as JohnWallStreet. That was stimulated by potential revisions in the federal Community Reinvestment Act to allow banks--which must make loans in lower-income areas, to fulfill that requirement by assisting sports venues. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) warned about “ handouts for billionaires with no benefit to the low-income communities this program [is] supposed to help.” So, does it help those low-income communities? That doesn't quite get answered. But the author notes that sports venues are now "integrated as anchor tenants within a greater neighborhood development project" and quotes sports economist Roger Noll as saying a busy venue "can actually enhance the value of the [neighboring] investments" and suggests th...

On 12/30/10 6sqft quoted  21 experts on NYC’s most important projects of the past decade . They interviewees cited the World Trade Center site, the High Line, Hudson Yards, and yes, the Barclays Center (though not Atlantic Yards): Christine Blackburn, real estate broker with Compass: I would say the  Barclays Center . It completely transformed that corridor and also expanded Boerum Hill over to 3rd Avenue.  That's interesting, because the transformation of Flatbush Avenue below Atlantic Avenue has very much been piecemeal, and the transformation above Atlantic Avenue has as much to do with the Downtown Brooklyn rezoning and the disposition of city sites around the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Another interviewee cited the arena: Bill Caleo, founder and managing director of The Brooklyn Home Company: Being a Brooklyn based developer, my impression is the Barclays Center is the most influential new building in NYC in the last decade. Brooklyn for the last 15 years has ...

Joe Vardon of the Athletic wrote 1/10/20  The boys are back in town: How Nets coaches and players live among Brooklynites, like the Dodgers of old , describing how Nets coach Kenny Atkinson lives in "charming Cobble Hill," and various players live in other neighborhoods, with good access to the team's practice facility in Sunset Park. That's unlike the New York Knicks, whose players have to travel to Westchester to practice. Writes Vardon: Atkinson is the first coach of a major pro team to live in Brooklyn since 1958 — when Walter Alston managed the Dodgers before they moved to Los Angeles. Like Alston before him, Atkinson walks among Brooklyn’s people because he’s become one of them. The same thing typically happens to the Nets’ players, like the Dodgers before them. Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant have been seen at the courts at Brooklyn Bridge Park: Upon signing with the Nets last summer, Irving purchased a high-rise condo overlooking the park in the DUMBO n...

Yes, it looks likes the sites for B12 and B13, 615 and 595 Dean Street respectively, have been cleared for future construction. They're expected to start this year, with some 800 rental units, at least 25% affordable, though the affordability level is unclear. As of last week and this coming week, no work other than fence repair was expected . Click on the links for more on the towers' design , open space , parking , and field house/fitness center . Looking south toward Dean Street Looking southeast toward Dean Street and Carlton Avenue, and the 535 Carlton tower (B14)

I had to twice read  The Decade Dominated by the Ultraluxury Condo , a New York Times Sunday Real Estate section cover story (1/12/20) published online today, to understand what it was really saying about Brooklyn. Could it be that, as shown in the screenshot at right, Downtown Brooklyn had only 1,574 condo units built between 2009 and 2019, fewer than not only Williamsburg but also Bedford-Stuyvesant? Not unlikely, I guess, as long as we're talking about for-sale condos. Downtown Brooklyn, as detailed in multiple reports, had far more rental units, especially if the starting point is moved back to the 2004 rezoning. For example, as cited in a February 2016 report from Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams's office, In terms of raw numbers of housing units, it was estimated that 979 projected units of housing would be built over the course of a decade, but the reality is that over 11,000 housing units have been developed or are in the pipeline. According to a 2019 re...

I must say, I had my doubts . But the first of three rounds of EB-5 investors into Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park--and the only round led by the New York City Regional Center (NYCRC) as middleman--have apparently been paid back, some eight-and-a-half years after the loan closed, according to a 1/6/20  press release  from the NYCRC. That stretched the original plan for a five-year maturity date and a two-year forbearance period, but perhaps the documents were amended. Or perhaps the investors--mainly Chinese nationals seeking green cards for themselves and their families--didn't have a choice. Greenland in charge The loan, originally made to a subsidiary of original developer Forest City Ratner, was originally said to be $249 million in funding from 498 investors, which later became $228 million from 456 investors, for reasons never publicly explained. That saved more than $100 million versus conventional financing, by my calculation. (There are two other EB-5 loan...

To a good number of people in and around Central Brooklyn, they're simply "Hakeem" and "Tish," charismatic, capable lawyer-politicians who've shown up at so many events and functions that they seem familiar. To political observers around the city, state, and country, they're now New York Attorney General Letitia James and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, House Democratic Caucus Chair. Those are powerful positions: other than Special Counsel Robert Mueller and House impeachment managers, James has been best positioned to investigate President Donald Trump, given that his companies and foundation conduct business in New York. Jeffries, fifth in the House Democratic leadership, is poised to rise even higher once senior leaders retire or step aside. James, in many ways, has a bigger job, and a tougher one. After all, she's got to run a vast department, while also pursuing policy reforms discussed during the campaign (cleaner government, voting reform) and, no...

Looking west across Sixth Ave. at Atlantic Ave. The latest Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park Construction Update (bottom), covering the two weeks beginning Monday, Jan. 6, was circulated yesterday at 5:24 pm (late!) by Empire State Development (ESD) after preparation by Greenland Forest City Partners. The only element seemingly new, compared to the previous update , is marked in red type and seems minor: at the Vanderbilt Yard, "Contractor to install minor steel structures (stairs, gates, etc.) in various locations within the yard, no public access ways will be impeded." It's not clear whether this is part of the completion of the revamped railyard, or a precursor to future work on a platform over the railyard. Looking north toward Atlantic Ave. But some repeated boilerplate--unless it's just a careless continuance from the previous update--is probably more significant: Saturday work is expected at both the B4 (18 Sixth) and B15 (664 Pacific) sites "throu...

On 12/4/19, Urban Omnibus published Unruly Bits , an intriguing essay on the challenges and complexity behind modular construction, notably the ill-fated 461 Dean (aka B2) at Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park, by Daniel Cardoso Llach , Associate Professor of Architecture at Carnegie Mellon University, where he chairs the Master of Science in Computational Design and co-directs CodeLab. The author notes the promise of the tower: Combining the latest digital design and building technologies, the tower would not only help the developer fulfill his multiple obligations towards the city — including public space, affordable housing, and construction jobs — but also herald a new era of efficiency in American construction .... The remarkably contentious and costly process of building the tower — which finally opened in 2016 (most of the renewal project remains under construction) — offers a lesson on the intertwining of design and urban politics with technology. The rhetoric of efficiency that he...

Now that Brooklyn Paper owner Schneps Media, recent buyer of amNewYork (now downsized), has bought (and apparently closed ) the other free daily, Metro, it's worth a look at the recent podcast interview, Schneps Media Publisher on Dominating Media Online and Offline . (Update 1/6/20: The Post reports that "A merged paper will be reflagged as amNewYork Metro" starting today.) Schneps has become the local news conglomerate in New York, and subject to considerable criticism, as in this article from Gothamist. I've seen them produce some useful local news, as well as essentially advertiser content, such as a Best of Brooklyn supplement . In the podcast, Publisher Victoria Schneps is interviewed by Brian Walker of AE Marketing Group, a brand, customer experience, and co-creation company. Talking journalism, and Amazon At 8:19 of the interview , Walker asks, "What do you look for in terms of like a quality of a writer or a story?" Schneps responds: ...

Updated with photos from 1/5/20. Woodland 1/3/20 The controversial bar/nightclub/restaurant Woodland, at Sixth and Flatbush Avenues on the edge of Park Slope, had its liquor license canceled as of yesterday, Jan. 3, by the State Liquor Authority . (See notice below and at bottom.) That document was issued two weeks after the SLA voted to uphold an administrative law judge who’d sustained numerous charges, after a multi-month hearing process. The charges included a disorderly premises, offering a DJ and dancing without a permit, serving illegally decanted alcoholic beverages, and becoming a focal point for police attention. The judge, after hearing testimony from neighbors, police, and SLA investigators, cited “a sustained and continuing pattern of relentless and unreasonable noise, unruly drunken patrons, loud crowds, filth such as vomit, urine, and feces.” (One factoid: noise from Woodland was audible inside the 78th Precinct, more than a block away.) The SLA even revers...