The Jane Jacobs Way for Coney Island

We have been writing a lot about Coney Island recently. Because of a proposed city rezoning plan, Coney’s fate hangs in the balance. (Your City Council members need to be contacted.) And we have also been keeping up with our Jane Jacobs Report Card Atlantic Yards posts. Monday morning Coney Island and Jane Jacobs came together in an event in which we participated.

“Jane Jacobs Way”

The city picked Monday to dedicate and rename a portion of Hudson Street where she lived “Jane Jacobs Way.” This produced the odd spectacle of politicians, including City Council Speaker Christine Quinn praising community activists and protestors who fight what used to be thought of as Robert Moses-style development, development that is oblivious to communities, their input and their wisdom about their own neighborhoods. These days that style of development is more apt to be thought of as Bloombergian. The event also produced protesters, mainly “an army Janes,” protesters who were dressed up as Jane Jacobs and asking that the city plan for Coney Island be fixed. We were one of that group; we wore Jane Jacobs glasses but not a wig.

Jane Jacobs and Coney
Two YouTube videos of the event are available. Save Coney Island masterminded the army of Janes and their video is available at their site: Save Coney Island Activists Rally Support at Jane Jacobs Ceremony. In addition, earlier in the day Save Coney Island released a statement from Jane Jacobs’s son, Ned Jacobs, critical of the city plan, saying in part.

While I cannot speak on behalf of my mother, the late Jane Jacobs, or predict what she would think about particular proposals today, in my view, this rezoning plan for Coney Island does not appear to reflect the urban values and planning principles she espoused. These include sensitivity and integration with the scale, character and performance of existing neighborhoods and their established uses; the need to retain aged but serviceable buildings for the sake of economic diversity and continuity, as well as for their history and charm; the benefits of planning and redevelopment based on organic, iterative change, and the inherent dangers of top-down urban renewal-type schemes, propelled by “cataclysmic money.”

(See: As N.Y. Honors Jane Jacobs, Her Son Is ‘Appalled’ at Coney Island Rezoning Plan.)

Jacobs Speaks About Bloombergian Development Directly to Bloomberg

Jane Jacobs is not around to speak on her own behalf anymore, but she has spoken often about New York. The last occasion we are aware of before her death in April of 2006 was when she wrote an April 15, 2005 letter to Mayor Bloomberg recommending the community plan alternative to the city’s proposed Williamsburg rezoning. Introducing herself as “a student of cities, interested in learning why some cities persist in prospering while others persistently decline” Ms. Jacobs wrote:

Let's think first about revitalization successes; they are great and good teachers. They don't result from gigantic plans and show-off projects, in New York or in other cities either. They build up gradually and authentically from diverse human communities; successful city revitalization builds itself on these community foundations, as the community-devised plan 197a does.

(See: Letter to Mayor Bloomberg and the City Council, by Jane Jacobs.)

That is obviously consistent with what her son Ned wrote and could easily apply directly to Coney or to many other large Bloombergian meg-endeavors like Atlantic Yards, Willets Point or the Columbia University’s expansion taking over West Harlem.

The same is true in what Ms. Jacobs writes at the letter’s end:

I will make two predictions with utter confidence. 1. If you follow the community's plan you will harvest a success. 2. If you follow the proposal before you today, you will maybe enrich a few heedless and ignorant developers, but at the cost of an ugly and intractable mistake. Even the presumed beneficiaries of this misuse of governmental powers, the developers and financiers of luxury towers, may not benefit; misused environments are not good long-term economic bets.

Come on, do the right thing. The community really does know best.

(Background: When we were at the City Council candidates debate in Williamsburg a number of weeks ago we noted that there was a great deal of apology in the air for the unfortunate ways that the plan was `unexpectedly’ turning out. New York magazine (July20-27 now on the stands) is also just now trying to sort out its own thoughts on some of this. See: The Billyburg Bust, by David Amsden, Jul 12, 2009: “A working-class neighborhood became a bohemian theme park, which in turn became a fantasyland for luxury-condo developers. Now, littered with half-built shells of a vanished boom, Williamsburg is looking like something else entirely: Miami.”)

The Odd Thing About Quinn and Jacobs
Here is the odd way that things stood on Monday morning. Christine Quinn was a central part of the ceremony dedicating “Jane Jacobs Way” in honor of Ms. Jacobs. There are probably few people paying attention to development in the city who believe that either Quinn or Bloomberg have a Jane Jacobian bone in their bodies. We ourselves were quoted in the NY Metro story about the event as follows:

“Jane Jacobs was about looking out and seeing what really works. The city’s plan is going to create a hole in the ground. Quinn and Bloomberg are the Robert Moses of today.”

(See: Celebrating Jacobs’ place in city, July the 13th, 2009, by Amy Zimmer.)

Besides the army of Jane look-alikes present in their attempt to rescue Coney Island, Suzannah B. Troy was also there to protest and quickly produced yet another video in an energetically heartfelt series of videos she has produced opposing “King Bloomberg” and Ms. Quinn, who assists him by passing administration-backed development proposals. Ms. Troy’s sentiments are clear from the title of her video: Protesting Christine Quinn at Jane Jacobs' street naming, Jane must be turning over in her grave!

Quinn Has the Power

Nevertheless, Quinn has the power right now of life or death for the Coney Island amusement area. Therefore Save Coney Island and the protesting Janes truly hope that it is possible to persuade Ms. Quinn to fix the city plan for Coney. Indeed, is Ms. Quinn is persuadable? She acknowledged as may be seen in the videos and as reported in the Metro that “phone calls are flooding City Hall urging the city to expand the area designated for amusements.” (To be viable the area for amusements needs to be expanded to a minimum of 27 acres as opposed to the 12 acres under the city plan.)

Ad Hominemism, Jacobs and Quinn

Jane Jacobs was not in favor of ad hominem attacks, but when it comes to city development issues we can't think of anyt where Quinn (or Bloomberg, from whom she is inseparable) has been on the right side. We also haven't seen that the inseparable pair are actually open to compromise as opposed to feigning that they are. Anyway, in terms of getting necessary messages across ad hominemism seems increasingly efficient when it comes to Quinn and Bloomberg. In this though we can’t speak for the Save Coney Island group, only for ourselves. We know the Save Coney Island people have their hopes about Ms. Quinn.

We have visited Quinn’s record on development before. (See: Monday, February 23, 2009, Un-funny Valentines Arriving Late: Your Community Interests at Heart.) A short list of the votes she has arm-twisted through that stand to affect the shape of urban fabric begins with the way she rushed Bloomberg’s term extension through the City Council. At his bill signing ceremony to overturn term limits Bloomberg indicated that he needed a third term in order to surmount the litigation stopping his projects. (Like the West Side Stadium? No, probably more like Atlantic Yards.)
At the Jane Jacobs dedication Doris Diether, a Jane Jacobs friend, told a story about how Ms. Jacobs had thwarted a maneuver by administration officials to rush through a vote so fast that no one would have any time to find out about it or react to the hastily unveiled public hearing. Ms. Jacobs reportedly delivered 200 citizens to testify at the hearing with only a weekend to do so. Times have changed but administration tactics haven’t: This kind of insider-manipulated rush was exactly the way that Quinn put through the major term limits law change for Bloomberg. (Ms. Diether was the one who was chosen to pull the cord to unveil the new street sign.)

Other Development Votes. .

The list of strong-armed votes continues with Quinn’s work on the previously mentioned Willets Point and Columbia University’s expansion into West Harlem. The City Council should also be withdrawing funds from the Atlantic Yards boongoggle but that is not likely to happen under Christine Quinn. (We once talked to her about it when she visited Brooklyn Heights.) Most recently, Quinn forced through the Dock Street project with a lopsided vote that totally disrespected David Yassky, the local City Council member for the DUMBO and Brooklyn Heights neighborhoods. She ignored not only the merits but also smoking gun e-mails that showed the Bloomberg administration and the School Construction Authority to be dishonestly collaborating in manipulations to put a school in the project for the sole purpose of promoting the project’s approval. We contacted Quinn’s office for her comment on those e-mails. They have still not been forthcoming. (See: Tuesday, June 9, 2009, Still No Comment from Speaker Quinn or Any Other of 18 City Council Members Who Put Dock Street Through Committee Last Week.)

. . . in Chelsea and Greenwich Village

Closer to her political home on Manhattan’s West Side, Ms. Quinn had been helpful in pushing through a sell-off of a portion of the Greenwich Village Historic District in order to subsidize a large new St. Vincent’s Hospital that also involves an exceptionally large new residential building being developed by the Rudin organization. Also, Chelsea Now says the community is complaining about the mounding up of extra density at “Himalayan” Hudson Yards. (See: Hudson Yards 'Himalayas' earn public ire at forum, Thursday, June 18, 2009, by Diane Vacca.) Not only is a great deal of extra density being put on that site but consider this for an example of how the Bloomberg administration wants to have its cake and eat it too: Notwithstanding the already extreme density of Hudson Yards, the Bloombergian Department of Housing, Preservation and Development is proposing to have the developer go off-site, outside the project footprint, to provide the assocaited affordable housing the community wants (at two off-site locations) but only if an additional zoning change is put through also up the density of the other sites as well.

Will Quinn Detect That People Are Getting Fed up and Change Course?

We have recently seen a great deal of the grass roots anger being directed toward Quinn. For instance, there is another YouTube labor-of-love video we came across recently done by Donny Moss that catalogues Quinn’s misdeeds and deceptions with particular focus on her betrayals with respect to the lesbian and gay community: Christine Quinn: Behind the Smile. We think that a lot of the anger being directed at Quinn now is earned by reason of her constant support for Bloomberg, particularly his Bloombergian style of development. Robert Moses, move over.

Will Quinn modify her behavior now that she is faced with a primary? She has two opponents for her 3rd district City Council seat: Maria Passannante-Derr and Yetta Kurland. We don’t know much about them yet, though if one of them is going to win it would be advisable for them not to engage in vote splitting.

Does Ms. Quinn feel vulnerable enough to start changing course? There is this primary and then, of course, she also wants to be mayor. Were it not for the term limits extension she would be running for mayor now, but the extension worked out well for her given the timing of her slush fund scandal.

The deadline for the City Council to fix the city plan is about to expire unless procedural maneuvers can briefly extend it. If the City Council under Quinn doesn’t act to fix that plan then Quinn’s Council ought to scrap the plan entirely.

Coney Island will provide an interesting test of whether Ms. Quinn will be changing course. Ms. Quinn clearly acknowledges that she heard the community’s request to fix the plan and knows the phone calls are flooding in. The question is whether she cares what the community wants if that’s not what the mayor wants.

(Above photo by Kevin Downs)

City’s Coney Island Plan: Our Skepticism of Times Editorial Credulity

Monday’s New York Times editorial on the city’s plan for Coney Island has one absolutely brilliant paragraph in it:

We like the Municipal Art Society’s idea of doubling the size of the amusement area and removing hotels from the south side of Surf Avenue. This way, when visitors get off the subway, they will meet sunlight and open air, not a high-rise barricade.

(See: A Plan for Coney Island, July 12, 2009.)

That one paragraph ought to be sufficient to communicate that the city’s overall plan is itself none too brilliant.

Wheat Is the Fix, Chaff Is the City Plan

The extracted paragraph above describes the core components people say are needed to “fix” the city’s Coney Island plan. There are other aspects of this “fix” not mentioned in the Times paragraph, like protecting Coney Island's historic buildings.

When you come right down to it, the aspects constituting the necessary fix would be the best part of the city plan if it ever passes, may be even the only good part. Most of the Times editorial is marred by far too much credulity respecting the benefits the city plan might actually have. That plan could also be destructive. We believe it is more likely to leave a hole in the ground if, as we must skeptically suggest, the city plan is destined to succeed in far fewer ways than touted.

Times Credulity

Credulity on the part of the Times sounds like this:

This is the year the place [Coney] could get moving again, if the City Council approves an ambitious redevelopment proposal from the Bloomberg administration. It calls for revitalized year-round amusements, badly needed apartments and new retail and commercial development. Coney Island is not just a decrepit carnival — it’s a community starving for civic amenities, affordable housing and jobs, all of which could flourish amid the tacky splendor of a reborn seaside paradise.

“This Is the Year”?

First off, when the Times says “This is the year” that Coney “could get moving again” it seems oblivious to the fact that Coney’s resurgence, at least as envisioned by the city, is likely to take generations, which is what real estate processionals are saying. (See: Thursday, May 28, 2009, A Second, But Not Seconding, Opinion: A Stolerian Eyebrow Raised, Real Estate Professionals Say Coney Island Development Will Take “Generations”.) As for starting on that plan now or starting soon, we are in a recession where financing for these kinds of mega-ventures is likely to be especially hard to come by and a where one of the major and currently improbable aspects of the city plan, hotels, will be impossible to finance.

Is Affordable Housing Badly Needed in Coney Island?

More subsidized affordable housing is concentrated in Coney than almost any other neighborhood in the city. Seth Pinsky, the city’s Economic Development Corporation president, testified before the City Council the first of this month that 1/6th of all Coney residents are in NYCHA housing. Many more residents live in other forms of subsidized hosing. We wonder if the Times is forgetting this when they suggest that Coney badly needs apartments because the neighborhood is “starving for . . . . affordable housing.”

At the City Council hearing Mr. Pinsky bemoaned that the average commute of Coney residents was exceptionally long: 45 minutes. We suspect that more housing is likely the only thing (if anything) that the city is really thinking will be built at Coney in the relatively near term. But if the city adopts a plan that makes it a priority to build more housing at Coney, doesn’t that simply bloat the number of New Yorkers with these troubling long commutes?

Can the Housing in the City Plan Actually Be Built?

If the Times is going to praise goal of building housing as a component of the city plan, shouldn’t the Times have mentioned that the city’s hope to build such housing currently faces a serious roadblock? The city wants to build almost all of the housing it plans to build on land currently mapped as parkland. It was mapped as parkland to preserve it for amusement use but the city is not using it that way. The housing can’t be built unless the legislature in Albany “demaps” the land. That is unlikely to happen, at least in this legislative session. So much for the idea that “this is the year.”

Housing That Is Actually Needed

Noticing New York is in favor of building housing in Coney but the affordable housing we have suggested building there is what we have referred to as next-step-up affordable home ownership program housing (including the program’s accompanying rental units) which would be attractive to residents of Coney’s other subsidized housing who were doing well enough to move out (and up), thus freeing up the units they vacate for others. That next-step-up housing could be done as infill and would not necessitate the sacrifice of amusement and seaside acres. That sounds like several wins at the same time to us.

Destroying a Traditional Source of Jobs

The Times values the city plan because it describes the community as “starving for . . . . jobs.” But the city plan fails to take advantage of the amusement industry as the traditional sources of jobs in the community. Rather than capitalize on what the amusement industry could offer, the city prefers to besiege the entertainment community, maginalizing it in an ever-shrinking cloister until it is eliminated entirely through attrition. The few remaining landmarked rides that may remain will serve as little more than gravestones.

Strengths of the Amusement Industry: A Point of Agreement

We have pointed out that with the current climate of economic adversity it seems to be a strange time to attack and undermine Coney’s amusement industry that we have described as remarkably “resilient.” The Times seems to agree with us: It describes Coney’s amusement attractions as “indestructible”:

[Coney’s]. . not dead yet, of course: landmarked rides like the Cyclone rumble on, and a few funkily indestructible carny attractions survive, along with the boardwalk, the hot dogs and the sea and sky.

While the tone seems to suggest that these things come so easily they perhaps need not be valued, isn’t it the opposite? Aren’t these the strong essences around which Coney’s resurgence ought to be planned:

● Landmarking its is historic assets (which the city refuses to do)
● The indestructible, resilient, funky carny attractions
● The boardwalk (deemphasized and underutilized by the city plan)
● The hot dogs (the city plan would encourage the destruction of Nathan’s)
● The sea and sky (refer back to the opening paragraph we extracted at the beginning of this post and the quote from the Times about changing the plan so arriving visitors may “meet sunlight and open air, not a high-rise barricade.”)

The city undervalues the strengths of Coney on which it can build and the Times does not seem to have picked up on this.

Open-air Seasonality vs. Indoor “Amusements”

The Times praises the city plan for calling for “revitalized year-round amusements.” But Coney needs to be appreciated for its seasonality, for the “sea and sky,” “sunlight and open air.” The danger is that if this is not respected Coney could be transformed into synthetic interior mall game arcades that are not likely to attract visitors to Coney when they failed to attract visitors to Times Square. Even worse, the city’s idea of non-open air amusements is most likely purely a guise for banishing the resilient and indestructible open-air amusements and building tall buildings that blot out the “seaside paradise” that the Times suggests can be “reborn.”

We are in favor of extending the season at Coney and there can be some year-round attractions. That is one reason the Shore Theater should be preserved, a step the city has been unwilling to take. We say start with preservation of things of recognized value; don’t focus on destruction first.
Civic Amenities, New Retail and Commercial Development

Preserving and putting the Shore Theater to use would also be an obvious step toward providing the “civic amenities” for which the Times says the community is starving. We have written about the city’s suspect goal of “new retail and commercial development,” (aside from the fact that it will not be built soon) especially to the extent that the city portrays that its goal is to do so for lower-income families. (See: Saturday, May 16, 2009, City Is Rezoning So Coney Island’s Lower-Income Residents Will Have Place to Buy Back-to-School Shoes, Clothing and Stationery? Right. Sure Thing!)

Praise in the Ballpark?

There is more that we disagree with in the Times editorial. It says, “There’s a nice ballpark.” Not really. The ballpark is awkwardly placed. It is in the middle of what was supposed be amusement acreage, making it difficult to use the land on either side. Its long, monotonous blank walls are surrounded by seaside land that has been unnecessarily tuned into a bleak parking lot that should have been put somewhere else. And did the ballpark lead to the Thunderbolt roller coaster being torn down? The ballpark exemplifies just another of the city’s continuos efforts to keep subtracting from the amusement area.

Skeptical of Recchia Skepticism?

While it fails to be skeptical of the city plan itself, the Times is skeptical of City Council member Domenic Recchia’s skepticism of the city plan:

Much depends on Domenic Recchia Jr., Coney Island’s councilman, who has been skeptical of the city’s plan while stoutly defending the interests of landowners, like his friend Mr. Sitt.

Bringing Thor Equities’ Joe Sitt into the discussion always tends to confuse the picture. It is true that Mr. Sitt’s land speculation has been very destructive to Coney. It was also something that the city caused to come about. (See: Tuesday, June 30, 2009, Destroying Coney: By Planning to Shrink Coney City Plays Into Sitt’s Land Speculation Schemes.)

Mr Sitt could very quickly be out of the picture. All it would take is for the city and Sitt to agree on a price for the city to acquire Sitt’s land. That is something that is quite likely even if the city’s own actions have driven up the price of Mr. Sitt’s exit. Skepticism of the city plan will become all the more important upon Mr. Sitt’s departure. Unfortunately, that may be the time when find Mr. Recchia’s skepticism of the city plan fades away.

What we are very likely to get without appropriate skepticism on the part of the City Council and the public is a city plan that is not fixed, a city plan where visitors to Coney will, in fact, be met by “a high-rise barricade” and will NOT be greeted by “sunlight and open air.” We are likely to get a Coney without a viable open-air amusement area, a Coney that turns out to be more a hole in the ground than anything else. Because, without skepticism we will have gotten a plan that was worse than no plan at all.

Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card #23: Protection Against Self-Destruction of Diversity of Building Use? NO

This is evaluation item #23 (of 47) of the Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card

Protection Against Self-Destruction of Diversity of Building Use? NO

(Some of the Buildings that would be demolished to build Atlantic Yards.)

Jane Jacobs describes a problem of the too successful city where diversity is lost when supplanted by crowded uses like banks or insurance companies that lack diversity. Though each is economically successful in its own right, Jacobs feels a dull monotony takes over with the crowding. She recommends counteracting the problem with zoning measures and by creating what she refers to as “staunch”public buildings that would hold their ground and not change their use over time. This has application to Atlantic Yards mainly in that buildings that could have been converted and enlisted for such “staunch” uses, perhaps as schools or libraries, are being torn down instead. Beyond that, it is difficult to foresee that Atlantic Yard will have future problems with the crowding of to too many similar successful enterprises.

(Above: Ward Bakery Building that could have been preserved and turned into a school, museum or central community facility.)

JJ Cites: [. . . . “staunch” “public buildings” with fixed purposes- p. 252. (Z)oning for diversity- - since the deliberate intent is to prevent excess duplication of the most profitable uses. . . p. 253]

(Below: Ward Bakery Building being demolished.)

Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card #22: Avoidance of Enterprises and Uses Harmful Because the Scale Is Wrong? NO

This is evaluation item #22 (of 47) of the Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card

Avoidance of Enterprises and Uses Harmful Because the Scale Is Wrong? NO
Jane Jacobs pointed out that there were enterprises or uses which she referred to as `exploding’ the street that were not, in themselves wrong, but which were harmful if they were operating at too large a scale, with too much disproportionately large street frontage. The disproportionately large street frontages at Ratner’s Atlantic Centers are examples of such street exploders and bode ill for Atlantic Yards. Security problems at Metrotech have created similar problems at that location which have gone unaddressed. But even if the ground floor space at Atlantic Yards is leased to retail operators that use smaller street frontages in a break from past Ratner practices, the effect of the street being broken up will occur because the buildings in Atlantic Yards are spaced apart so that they will not have continuous uninterrupted streets. They will be unavoidably broken up by large gaps. If anything, this may make it more of practical challenge to arrive at good street frontages where there is continuous street frontage.
JJ Cites: [. . . . enterprises harmful not because of their nature, exactly but because in certain streets their scale is wrong. . . . . Visually, they are disorganizing to streets, and so dominating that it is hard- - sometimes impossible– for any countering sense of order to make much impression. . . . On certain streets, any disproportionately large occupant if street frontage is visually a street disintegrator and desolator, although exactly the same kinds of uses, at small scale, do no harm and are indeed an asset. . . . a use that abruptly takes street frontage on a large scale can appear to explode the street- - make it fly apart in fragments. P. 234 a big cafeteria, supermarket, a large woodworking factory or printing plant- - - can wreak havoc (and sometimes auditory havoc) because it is on a different scale. P.235]

Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card #21: Avoidance of Harmful Gigantic Outdoor Advertising? NO

This is evaluation item #21 (of 47) of the Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card

Avoidance of Harmful Gigantic Outdoor Advertising? NO

(A fifteen story sign- bigger than these in Times Square- illuminated and animated in the middle of the brownstone neighborhoods of Prospect Heights and Fort Greene. Click to ENLARGE- if you dare.)

Jane Jacobs was unusually tolerant of what ought to be permitted in an urban environment but goes out of her way to say that except in very unusual situations very large billboards and signage is destructive because they are visually disorganizing to streets, and overly dominating. The Atlantic Yards proposal involves illuminated (changeable and perhaps animated) electronic signage of up to 150 feet,- That is billboards 15 stories tall- and to accomplish putting these signs in the middle of historic brownstone neighborhoods would override local regulations which would normally, in such an area, be stricter than usual to prevent such signage. No sports facility in the city has similarly huge signage. In what should be interpreted as a tacit admission that this signage is objectionable and inappropriate, the Ratner organization’s project publicity always depicts the megadevelopment with the signs missing from where they would be seen. Various respected organizations have gone out of their way to object to this signage, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Scenic America and the Municipal Art Society.

(Since this was originally written the Frank Gehry designs for Atlantic Yards have been scrapped and replaced by a generic design where the arena would look like an airplane hanger. Other parts of the mega-project design are still unreleased but there has been NO information that the plan for fifteen story illuminated signage has been dropped. Forest City Ratner was previously adamant about not dropping it and government officials were unwilling to require that the signage be disincorporated from the plan. Confusing the issue further is the fact that, as noted, Forest City Ratner doesn’t incorporate the signage in its renderings. Even if and when new renderings come out, the inclusion or exclusion of such signage would not be a reliable indicator of whether it is still planned.)

JJ Cites: [. . . . Usually but not always. What would Times Square be without huge outdoor advertising? P. 234 . . . . Visually, they are disorganizing to streets, and so dominating that it is hard- - sometimes impossible– for any countering sense of order to make much impression. P. 234]

(Below: The new 10-story Atlantic Terrace affordable housing project now being built across the street from the proposed Atlantic Yards site. Atlantic Terrace stands taller than many of the nearby brownstones and other buildings in the neighborhood. The illuminated animated Atlantic Yards signage would be even 50% taller, another looming five stories taller over the Atlantic Terrace project.)

Waiting for What Thompson Will Say Specifically about Atlantic Yards

City Comptroller and candidate for mayor, William Thompson, kicked off a five borough tour in Brooklyn Saturday morning. (See our Friday, July 10, 2009, Will Thompson Kick It Off Right In Brooklyn?)
Thompson kept it general about a lot of things: Bloomberg is doing a horrendous job- He, Thompson, would be doing a much better one.

He said the following about development (emphasis supplied):

I am running for mayor because in these difficult times, we need a leader who is on our side. In these difficult times, we need a leader who will move our city forward by ensuring that all New Yorkers, not just the rich, prosper. All of us here today know, for the past eight years Mike Bloomberg has been focused on the people at the top, Wall Street crowd, the developers, the wealthy. Well, let’s be honest: That approach hasn’t gotten us far.

* * * *
[Then, after the obvious freebie criticizing Bloomberg’s abuse of power to overturn term limits . . . ]

Mike Bloomberg might think this city can’t afford to have someone else as mayor but I believe that New York can’t afford another four years of Mike Bloomberg. We can’t afford another four years of a mayor with the wrong priorities. We can’t afford another four years of a mayor who protects the wealthy while making it harder for everyone else to make ends meet. We can’t afford a mayor who give money away to Wall Street instead of investing in small businesses. And in these tough times we can’t afford to make the wrong choices. There is a simple choice in this election: This is a choice between two guys, one who wakes up every day and protects millionaires, fights for developers and giveaways to Wall Street- - And ME, . . . a guy who will get up every day and fight for our hard working families, for parents, for our seniors, for small businesses, for New Yorkers across all five boroughs and for you.

We are waiting because it is obvious that Thompson will soon have to say a lot more and get specific about Atlantic Yards. And as we said when we wrote previously, it should be easy for him to come up with some stiff criticism: The project which was always bad has gotten so much worse.

Meanwhile, a few notes about Saturday morning. Mostly what was important was who was there. (Marty Markowitz was not.)

A lot of people were there. This photo is early when the crowd was still growing.
Two candidates for City Comptroller were there, both Queens City Councilman John Liu and Brooklyn City Councilman David Yassky, both opponents of Atlantic Yards. We wrote about criticisms Mr. Liu expressed about the megadevelopment in June. (See: Sunday, June 7, 2009, A Lambda Night: City Political Candidates and Development (Focusing on Atlantic Yards and Dock Street)) We had a few words with him Saturday about the boondoggle project which he again said really needs to be stopped.
(Mr. Lui in white shirt above.)

Mr. Lui brought troops to Brooklyn.
In addition to taking on the Dock Street project recently, David Yassky has made quite a few appropriately emphatic on-target statements against Atlantic Yards in recent months (See: Wednesday, May 6, 2009, City Council Races (33rd and 39th CDs): Candidates’ Positions on Development and Effective Action They Would Take to Stop Atlantic Yards (Part II).) Mr. Yassky also showed up to speak about Atlantic Yards at the MTA’s meeting the end of June. Like almost all of the elected officials at that meeting, he criticized the MTA’s giveaways to Ratner. He said it undercut the entire case MTA had made when it pleaded that it was short of funds, making for a cynical and disillusioned public.
Another stalwart Atlantic Yards opponent, City Council member Tish James, was there. At least where we were standing it sounded like she got the loudest cheers of everyone whose name was announced from the lectern.

The local City Council candidates are opposed to Atlantic Yards pretty much across the board. Two of them were there.
Jo Anne Simon, candidate for the 33rd District.
And Josh Skaller, candidate for the 39th. We hear that Mr. Skaller is doing very well in his campaign (in terms of signed petitions and fund raising- none from developers) and that his success probably has a lot to do with people’s appreciation of his deeply ingrained opposition to Atlantic Yards.

Also present was Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries, who represents the 57th. Mr. Jeffries was recently busy in the news, questioning city and state development agency staff about:

. . .whether the agency [MTA] was performing its fiduciary duty on behalf of the public and suggested that the term "value engineering" connoted a bailout.

(See: Friday, May 29, 2009, Senate hearing: no tough questions for ESDC; MTA yields on yard; IBO calls arena a loss; arena 2012; raucous AY supporters make for 8/23/06 flashback.)

Anyway, as we said, we will be very interested in hearing what specifically Mr. Thompson has to say about Atlantic Yards. How categorically will he distinguish himself from the Mr. Bloomberg who is not doing a good job as mayor? Tony Avella is Mr. Thompson’s rival candidate for the Democratic nomination. We know how thoroughly opposed Mr. Avella is to Atlantic Yards. We also that the Green party candidate, Billy Talen, (aka Reverend Billy) is wholeheartedly opposed to the mega-project.

Saturday the crowd picked up the chant, “Billy T is for me.” That, by coincidence could also mean “Billy Talen.” But, in Noticing New York’s view, if Mr. Thompson is clearly “for the citizens of New York,” then we think he needs to avoid confusion and make clear statements about what’s wrong with Atlantic Yards and why Bloomberg’s own support of it is wrong.

Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card #20: Avoidance of Harmful Gas Stations? MAYBE YES/MAYBE NO

This is evaluation item #20 (of 47) of the Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card

Avoidance of Harmful Gas Stations? MAYBE YES/MAYBE NO

(Image from Atlantic Yards Report. Click to enlarge.)

Jane Jacobs suggested that gas stations in the wrong areas would deaden neighborhoods. Those looking for a positive accomplishment in the Atlantic Yards Development can point out that a gas station will be one of the condemned businesses. On the other hand, the gas station which sits on an island on busy Flatbush Avenue might be in about as good a place as it might ever be in terms of not disturbing an adjoining neighborhood. Arguably, on the other side, when it goes out of business at this location it is possible the demand for an unfilled service may result in a new gas station springing up in a less desirable location.

(Since this was originally written the gas station is gone: See above photo from Atlantic Yards Report. Instead you can go to the similar still remaining one below on Atlantic Avenue between Brooklyn Heights and Cobble Hill.)
JJ Cites: [. . . .Visually, they are disorganizing to streets, and so dominating that it is hard- - sometimes impossible– for any countering sense of order to make much impression. P. 234]