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April 2, 2006
Opponents of Ratner's Atlantic Yards Plan Gain, Reducing Size of Project and Re-shaping Scoping Process
Big Cities Big Boxes:
The document on which State environmental review focuses is called an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). For every project, the developer and the state, with limited opportunity for public comment, determine what questions--the "scope" of review--this environmental study must answer. Thus, ESDC's concessions in the scoping process are, as The Times says, "significant victory" for critics. Up until now, the ESDC has refused to consider alternative proposals, and it has maintained that study of the project's effects should be limited to its immediate area. The three alternative proposals the ESDC will now consider, however, will include the proposal from the rival developer, Extell Corporation, that project critics in the coalition Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn themselves brought into the bidding process for the Atlantic Yards site with the Metropolitan Transit Authority. The ESDC has also agreed now to expand the main geographic area of the study to half a mile from the project site, from a quarter mile, and to increase from 65 to 93 the number of intersections where traffic impact will be studied.The Ratner project remains far too large for Brooklyn, too tall, too dense, and too wide, even after yesterday's five-per-cent reduction in bulk. As DDDB spokesman Dan Goldstein told The Times, it is larger than when Ratner first announced his plans. In addition, the scope of the environmental review, as a vice-president of the Regional Plan Association, Christopher Jones, noted, fails to consider the project's impact beyond its expected completion date, 2016.
Posted by amy at April 2, 2006 9:36 PM