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May 19, 2008
Not Mr. Gehry's neighbourhood?
A Frank Gehry-designed arena complex in Brooklyn is a target in New Yorkers's favourite blood sport - real estate
Toronto Globe and Mail
By now, surely, Frank Gehry is inured to the revulsion of others. After wrestling with the Spanish over his whimsical Guggenheim Bilbao museum, with Angelenos over his blindingly reflective Walt Disney Concert Hall, with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology over leaks in a $300-million complex he designed there, and with his own neighbours over his chain-link-fence-adorned house in Santa Monica, the 79-year-old Canadian-born architect is now one of the primary targets of community activists over the gargantuan Atlantic Yards development in downtown Brooklyn, of which he is the chief architect.
Conceived more than four years ago when developer Bruce Ratner purchased the New Jersey Nets and announced his intention to move them to Brooklyn, Atlantic Yards was envisioned as an instant neighbourhood: a 16-building, nine-hectare complex that would throw down an 18,000-seat basketball arena, thousands of luxury condos, low-income housing, and eight office towers.
The only problem was, there was already a neighbourhood there.
Posted by lumi at May 19, 2008 4:24 AM