Planners and Players Sought

Atlantic Yards: It is big (very), it is bad (ugly is relative), and it is unfortunate, but so what?

Point 1

Clarity on the DEIS/CEQR process. Is it possible? Recognize the bait and switch and decide what the penalty for being offered one thing but getting another?

Goal: Have some fun with the technical stuff to get people thinking about real place making. AKA – piling on…

Objective: Make a serious run at the fact checkers. Get to the point where we will be more interested in finding ways to move the goal posts or wag the dog, and so on.

Strategy: Draft up a major set of questions by type/scope (about 1,000 of them) for the Draft EIS all with a demand for metrics (See a starter set in Section VI below --- think of it as a “for the record” thing and very useful later.

Point 2

The long anticipated Atlantic Center project broke ground on 30 September 1994. Recall the vision of the late Harry Simmons on housing and compare that with the result NYCHP result… The public was assured that 365,000 square foot retail development and a 650 car garage would be developed. Theleasing plan assured a substantial portion of Atlantic Center as a Bradley’s and a Pathmark. The Pathmark is a standard 50-70K and the “Bradley de jure” is 100 to 150K, and leaves over 100K in small retail store, vendors, and the like. In the second phase (estimated correctly to be within five years) an additional 442,000 square feet ofretail space and a 450 car garage was developed. The proof is in; the Ratner development team tends to do what it says it will do. Is this about a sports image or a massive housing development plan? Mike Lupica on behalf of chuck e cheese, said it best only a guy named Bruce could sell a massive housing project as a sports deal. So in large type:

Goal: Separate housing, housing. Get more than an M0U on the school site from the usual suspects and set a deadline for deadline renewal.

Objective: Isolate all answers to the “housing who” question that fall firmly into the category of “it depends”. This allows us to frame the debate, as an “it depends” planning issue – delay, lack of results, poor product.

Strategy: Press for an op-ed style debate. i.e. If they screw ACORN – what could ACORN do? Or you do?

Point 3: Deal or No Deal

One of the great assets of a community tends to be its long memory of past events and promises. With the gift of term-limits, there are new rules. All useful agreements with term limited city council members are now of necessity contractual signed agreements. They are broken at the political risk of the next election and can stay in force regardless of the next representative. Following, are suggested components for assessing Downtown Brooklyn.

In the spirit of “no one is as smart as all of us”, I suggest working a list, and plugging in the metrics that each heading demands or failing that change the heading.

Refine it well enough to express a planning values matrix as a matter of balance if now power and for the record. The goal is to represent “what’s right” in our collective minds, that is at least, if not equally subjective as what’s right in Ratner’s financial value matrix. In other words, the argument should be on quality and thereafter on whether
or not Development will produce $20 billion vs. $10 billion in revenue.

Goal: There is Not Deal on the promotion of "evil empire" style (if not fasion) in architecture. In this case a steady flow of criticism such as, "drunken sailors" seem on the mark. This was followed with another arch-joke about "a bride".

Objective: Deal to acquire a sensitive scale and place. Same as DDB position. It is correct.

Strategy: Tactics that produce the Deal/No Deal type of debate requires the prize of delay. It is with delay that planners avoid "poor results" if people organize sufficiently to present an alternative. Recall how Tump got the community to pay for a solution by presenting (what was it?) yes a mile high building. (clever boy, very clever).

Massive integrated outline (in development):

These are main points for talk, research and planning:

1) Is it true?
2) Is it logical?
3) Is it moral?

Study your answer to these questions, then go with your gut...

The major headings get prioritized once confidence forms...silly to do it before hand.

I. Design Criticism: Example A: Atlantic Yards is a Super Block (duh, its the super block stupid)

• We know for a fact that super blocks do not work. We know the street grid works when intact.
• Small blocks mixed with larger areas, entrances, exits, clear urban corridors and pathways,
  major pedestrian routes to gateways and open space. We need to fire Frank. We really do.
• Anyone like to take a “Why Brooklyn should Fire Frank” letter with the theme
  1 in 7 in the USA can trace their ancestry to Brooklyn….

II. Mass Transit: Quality of the Mass Transit HUB (we going to need a bigger boat)

• We know that point loading mass transportation systems in New York City can work fairly well if there is room for it. Or if, the loading and unloading is over three hours for any assembly of 15 to 20K.
• If you never noticed the cars on the 7 line lining up en masse when a big Mets game at Shea is coming to an end you are missing a visual treat, but that is one line far away from the enormous transit HUB presented at the intersection of Flatbush Avenue, 4th Avenue and Atlantic Avenue. Here there is little room for a 7 line queue. Enviornmentally no queue room, no arena.
• Subway system is already operating over capacity during peak hours. This affects all of the Atlantic Avenue station elements (all platforms, entrances/exits/turnstiles, stairways) every square foot. Unless new space is made to point load for peak service to this HUB the public’s safety, health and welfare is put at risk.
• I’m told that the MTA doesn’t really need that yard at all, so if any public money is going into it is for nothing. What is the MTA’s position and so what if they are lying?

III. Surface Transportation: Intersecting Nightmares (when buses fly)

• Roadway network/intersections operating at poor to dangerous levels of service (LOS), constraining
  bus movements throughout and pedestrian flows at crosswalks Weekend midday has become a
  new travel peak focused on shopping at Atlantic Center. Can’t shop then go to a game,
  they won’t let you in with packages.
• Non-traditional period study of transit, roadway, and parking conditions should be a priority.
  Are there alternatives to ART-TAB and ART-PLAN?
• The Lower Manhattan/JFK Airport Access Project runs in close proximity. How close? What effect?
• Are traffic calming initiatives proposed by NYCDOT at Atlantic Avenue/4th Avenue included
  in the modeling? Clean Air Act Amendments 1990 brought transport decisions into the mix.
  Employee commute options (ECO) for example are postproduction anything pre-development with
  teeth?
• APA Policy: Break out a Parking Pro-Forma (this is brilliant by David) Unbundled the cost of 2,700 parking spaces (given 6,800 units at 40%) from the TDC could be tied to drivers directly. (Is there code, zone or tax law literature on this? It is brilliant because: Sticking the parking spaces to the purchase or rental of individual residential (or office units) could create a premium housing certificate for all parking over 40% of units residential. (clean air enforceable 1990) Create inclusionary bonus for affordable housing using a San Francisco style commercial office formula. It seems the bridesmaid’s dresses are still on order.

IV. Ratner’s Unprecedented CBA (bacon and eggs are good)

• The community benefits agreement was quick, easy and about $500 million short of being beneficial.
  Apologies to the signatories, but this shortfall would have become clear if the dialogue
  had been transparent and open.
• We know that an extensive and thorough public process works well. Those that develop through
  the vision of a few will fail on all levels with one exception – the short term financial
  gain of the “risk takers”. Why does the margin for reducing risk to nothing always
  become the public’s expense?
• While contentious, the process of public criticism and a teetering topped off market seems
  is reducing the project in scale, but not effect.
• Ask Raymond Levin Wachtel & Masyr LLP for an amicus brief.

V. The Takings Issue

• Willing seller, willing buyer defines the market for equity holders.
• Those without equity and/or of lower income find the hidden tax of routine displacement without
  representation from one neighborhood to the next a hard pill to swallow. In the divide and
  conquer world of real estate holding and assembly the precedent for new case law that might
  trigger the public provision of equity for the powerless is needed. I just do not know, but
  there is a “guttman” in there somewhere.
• Would you buy a used car from this man strategy: The “due process” issues could
  offer more options.
• The need for the “deck” (and de-mapped streets?) could offer other options of
  a public failure to argue for the best deal/no deal negotiation.
• Define the future of the homeless and the shelter on the project site and loss of social
  services.
• APA financial support for investigating the Planning Law issues raised.
• Ask Ross Moskowitz, Stroock & Stroock & Lavan LLP for amicus brief that could be
  used to raise some money.
• The Ohio Supreme Court killed a blight/economic development taking recently. I came across
  Robert Reis from Buffalo as a municipal/state constitution expert, are there any in NYC...
  

VI. Pro Forma Analysis (anyone doing this?)
Seems if your offering a 30% return on a the billions invested there are public interests...

• Find $7 Billion in the TDC and work back into it for flaws (Goal: show the $20Billion in profit)
• The non-binding MOU (March 2005) was to provide a 30 year pro-forma. Do we have it?

Residential Units

Units Establish Rate Metrics
Total Development $

4,500 $250 Rental (50% affordable at 150% of median)
2,400 $300 Condo (Market rate) No affordable condos is an issue.

Hotel (watch that Trump condo-hotel)
165,000 sq. ft. $220,000,000

Commercial Office
600,000 sq. ft. $180,000,000

Commercial Retail
247,000 sq. ft. $150,000,000

Arena
17,000 seats $180,000,000

Mass Transit Improvements
Rail Yard Alignment $200,000,000
Station Bonus Work $300,000,000

TDC $7 Billion..give or take a billion

VII. 1,000 Questions (first three…)

1. List all individual pollutants discharged in the environment. Conduct a
   public health correlation analysis from asthma to the “sick building”
   syndrome. Detail disproportion impact issues by age and income.
2. Demands for nonrenewable forms of energy are unsustainable. How does the project
   factor this into its pro-forma? Con Edison continues to make less energy in
   the city and imports an increasing share. What are the mega region impacts
   of externalizing our energy use? What is the co-gen offer from Bruce? Nada?
3. Public services are a vital part of the quality of the urban life.
   What are the added demands on public services (person hours and capital in
   use) defined on capita basis locally and with the city?