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April 28, 2008
City forcing its will upon Coney Island
MetroNY
By Neil deMause
NY City revised the plan for Coney Island in the hopes of “getting something done,” which is a good thing, right?
Worse yet, focusing on “getting things done” doesn’t even always get things done. Too often, it’s meant putting all the city’s eggs in one basket — witness Bruce Ratner’s maybe-on-hiatus Atlantic Yards project, where the city’s hopes for a sweeping remaking of the Brooklyn railyards could instead end up leading to 20 years of empty lots. It’s important to remember that historically, there are plenty of districts that developed because the city didn’t get things done — say, SoHo, which was colonized by artists after Robert Moses’ Lower Manhattan Expressway scheme collapsed — achieving more gradual, organic change. Sometimes, slow and steady wins the race.
Posted by lumi at April 28, 2008 4:20 AM