BY BEN VERDE
City planning bigwigs formally
kicked off the lengthy rezoning
process of 960 Franklin
Avenue in Crown Heights on
Monday, starting the clock on
a developer’s long-shot bid to
erect a large residential tower
just 150 feet from the Brooklyn
Botanic Garden — but the
proposal was quickly met with
fi erce opposition from local
stakeholders, City Hall, and the
City Planning Commission.
“Simply put, the project applicant
is seeking way too much
density for this site,” said City
Planning Commission Chair
Marisa Lago during a Feb. 1
meeting of the commission.
“Leading to an overbearing envelope
with no precedent and a
development that is grossly out
of scale with the surrounding
context.”
While the rezoning proposal
was certifi ed during the virtual
hearing, allowing the sixto
eight month Uniform Land
Use Review Procedure to begin,
the commissioners made
clear that they did not support
the plan — and they would use
their advisory position to recommend
COURIER L 10 IFE, FEBRUARY 5-11, 2021
that the proposal not
go forward.
Commissioners cited data
from the proposal’s Environmental
Impact Statement that
shows that the 421-foot towers,
which the rezoning would
allow construction of, would
cloak parts of the nearby Botanic
Garden in shadow for several
hours each day year-round
— potentially devastating the
fl ower emporium’s plant life.
“I have never seen an environmental
impact statement
with such a stark, scary description
of the open-space impacts
here,” said Commissioner
Anna Hayes Levin.
Monday’s certifi cation sets
off the city’s lengthy ULURP,
with the proposal now subject
to numerous public meetings
involving local Community
Board 9, Borough President
Eric Adams, Mayor Bill de Blasio,
and the City Council.
The Brooklyn Botanic Garden,
which sits a stones-throw
from the project site, has rallied
against the mega-project
since details of the towers fi rst
emerged, and launched its
“Fight for Sunlight” awareness
campaign in 2019.
Garden leadership condemned
the plan’s certifi cation
on Monday, calling the plan
“ill-conceived” and a “slap in
the face.”
“The entire ill-conceived,
vastly out of scale project is
an existential threat to Brooklyn
Botanic Garden and its
century-old living museum of
plants,” said Brooklyn Botanic
Garden President Adrian Benepe
in a statement. “The project
itself, and the developer’s
insistence on pressing forward
A rendering of the proposed developments at 960 Franklin Avenue.
Continuum Company
despite widespread opposition
at all levels, is a slap in the face
to the people of Brooklyn and
New York City.”
The mayor, whose rubber
stamp is essential for land-use
changes to pass, came out in opposition
to the multi-tower project
in December, telling Gothamist
he felt the project was
“grossly out of scale with the
neighborhood” — a move that
came months after internal
Parks Department documents
showed that the city was aware
of the potential damage to the
adjacent garden.
The proposal has only been
slightly modifi ed since then,
knocking the height of the tallest
towers down from 39 stories
to 34 stories.
Developing story
Long-shot land use process begins for
controversial Botanic Garden-adjacent towers
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