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June 17, 2009
The amazing shrinking railyard deal: partial payment, partial benefits, and (possibly) no platform and a much-shrunken AY project
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder adds up the costs of the "switch" in Forest City's replacement railyard bait 'n' switch.
It's not just that Forest City Ratner (FCR) was awarded the right to develop the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's (MTA) Vanderbilt Yard for $100 million in cash, even though another developer bid $150 million and the MTA's own appraiser valued the site at $214.5 million--after deducting the cost to a bidder of constructing a new railyard (albeit a more basic one than FCR promised).
It's not just that the MTA, after initial resistance, has agreed to let FCR build a replacement railyard of seven rather than nine tracks, a successor to a railyard that once had ten shorter tracks but with (apparently) greater capacity.
It's not just that the MTA apparently is being requested to allow Forest City Ratner to make a much lower down payment--a reported $20 million, though that's not confirmed--for the portion of the railyard needed for the arena block, and pay off the rest over some (yet) unspecified time.
It's also that Forest City Ratner's multi-component railyard bid, which the developer variously claimed was worth $492.4 million or $445 million or $329.4 million, would be worth significantly less than promised. (I address the calculation lower down in this article.)
What about the platform?
Most crucially, it's also that one of the most important components of the project--the plan to deck over the central and eastern segments of the railyard (Blocks 1120 and 1121)--has become less likely.
That would put in doubt the six towers scheduled for those two blocks, and the attendant housing and open space.
...The current version of Atlantic Yards already appears to be significantly different than the plan that was promoted to the public and to elected officials. The configuration of the buildings shifted, but it was supposed to be a 16-tower buildout in ten years.
Both those numbers have become suspect, and the absence of a platform would take Atlantic Yards further down the road toward Atlantic Lots.
Posted by eric at June 17, 2009 11:05 AM