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Since 1978 • (718) 260–2500 • Brooklyn, NY • ©2019 16 pages • Vol.Serving Brownstone Brooklyn, Sunset Park, Williamsburg & Greenpoint 42, No. 51 • December 20–26, 2019
SUGAR HIGH!
Developers want to build two 600 foot towers,
beaches, next to Domino site in Williamsburg
By Kevin Duggan
Brooklyn Paper
A Dumbo development firm unveiled
designs on Thursday for two, massive
skyscrapers, along with new beaches
and parkland planned for the Williamsburg
waterfront.
Two Trees Management — the company
responsible for redeveloping the
site of the former Domino Sugar factory
— wants to erect the 650- and 600-
foot towers at a former industrial fueloil
storage complex once owned by
Con Edison, located on River Street
between Grand and N. Third streets,
which the firm purchased for $150 million
on Wednesday.
And in place of the current vacant
lots there, flashy renderings created by
high-profile landscape architects James
Corner Field Operations and architecture
firm Bjarke Ingels Group display
an idealized vision of a planned 3.5-
acre park, a looping boardwalk, and
two small beaches along the shores of
the East River.
The new towers will feature 1,000
residential units, 250 of which will be
offered to tenants making 40-60 percent
of the city’s area median income
— currently pegged at $96,100 for a
family of three — under the city’s Mandatory
Inclusionary Housing program,
according to the development company’s
CEO Jed Walentas.
The towers will host a YMCA featuring
an Olympic-sized pool on the ground
floor, and will dwarf Williamsburg’s current
tallest tower — Two Tree’s nearby
mixed-use skyscraper One South First,
which stands at 435 feet tall.
The publicly-accessible park will
consist of two beaches — one between
N. First and N. Third streets, and another
bordering the small city-owned
Grand Ferry Park, which borders a natural
gas plant owned by the New York
Power Authority between Grand and
North First streets, which will remain
in operation.
Along the plant’s water-facing side,
there will be a host of kiosks for community
activities, such as boating and
fishing.
The looped walkway encircles a shallower
section of the East River and will
connect with a path to two existing cylindrical
pier foundations known as caissons,
which the developer plans to repurpose
as viewing points and outdoor
activity stations.
The smaller beach will also have a
raised path to a third caisson with water
in the middle, which could serve as
an outdoor classroom for environmental
education.
The two pier structures will shelter
the beaches, creating some 3 acres of
protected water space.
The park will feature berms, breakwaters,
marshes, and wetlands designed
to take the force out of storm surges,
which will reduce the risk of flooding
and provide more room to absorb water,
according to the developers.
This will make the section of the waterfront
more resilient than a simple bulkhead
construction, as was the case with
the Domino Park, and all the residential
units are built above the 500-year floodplain,
according to the developers.
Two Tree’s plans require the City
Council rezone the site — which currently
only permits commercial and industrial
use — to allow mixed residential
and commercial use, which will require
the developer endure the city’s lengthy
land use review process.
Two Trees bigwigs have presented
the plans to city officials and local community
leaders, according to Walentas,
who couldn’t say when he planned to
kick off the public review process, but
said that he wanted to get the plans approved
within the two years before the
de Blasio administration ends and elections
shake up City Council.
Building into the waterbody will also
require approval by the state’s Department
of Environmental Conservation and
the US Army Corps of Engineers.
The plans to redevelop the site for
large-scale residential use met with opposition
at closed-door meetings with
local community leaders during the
summer.
One attendee said the site be developed
as a private park, and complained
that the area is already overpopulated,
according to a Brownstoner report.
A neighborhood group called Sustainable
Williamsburg — formerly Friends
of the Northside Waterfront — formed
earlier this year to oppose a residential
rezoning on the site, which went on sale
in 2018, saying the area’s infrastructure
could not handle thousands of new residents
and that the site should instead be
developed under its current zoning to host
James Corner Field Operations and BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group, courtesy of Two Trees Management
retail, office, and light manufacturing,
the Greenpoint Post reported.
But Walentas argued that it made
sense to build residential units, because
most of that waterfront is now
lined with other projects of that size,
adding that a working waterfront is a
way of the past and that the residential
development would pay for a substantial
new public amenity.
“Shipping and industrial uses make
less and less sense along our urban
waterfronts and things like parks and
housing and schools and soft-scale retail
make a lot more sense,” he said.
“Just like we demonstrated at Domino
Park, without any public money, by
using density as a value creating tool,
we created 100 millions of dollars in
public good, between the parks that
we built and all the affordable housing
we’ve created.”
Meet the city’s worst slumlord
Report crowns Brooklyn man with ignominious distinction
By Todd Maisel
for Brooklyn Paper
Brooklyn is home to the worst
landlord in New York City, according
to a new report from Public
Advocate Jumaane Williams.
Property owner Jason Korn manages
13 properties in Brooklyn, and
two in Manhattan, that made the
Public Advocate’s 2019 New York
City Landlord Watchlist — featuring
a combined 2,877 open violations
with the city’s Department
of Housing Preservation.
Korn’ properties — which are
located in Midwood and Prospect
Lefferts Gardens, among
other neighborhoods — house a
combined 703 units, where tenants
routinely files complaints
about peeling lead paint, rats,
roaches and other vermin, dangerous
black mold and water leaking
into apartments, according to
Williams’ report.
The Public Advocate blasted
Korn as the “worst landlord” —
and pointed out that he has risen
on the annual dishonor list.
“He was number nine last year,”
said Williams. “Now he is number
one.”
Williams presented his findings
at a press conference on Monday
morning alongside various politicos,
including New York State
Attorney General Letitia James
— the former Public Advocate
— who threatened to take legal
action against landlords who violate
their basic responsibilities
to their tenants.
“They need to know, there is a
new sheriff in town,” James said.
“We will not go silently into the
night, we know the power of this list
and the shame they will face.”
And Brooklyn is no stranger to
other bad actors, according to Williams’
report, which shows that
44 of the 85 properties owned by
the 10 worst private landlords are
in Kings County.
But, according to Williams, the
private landlords misdeeds pale in
comparison to the porous conditions
featured in the city’s public
housing stockpile — which feature
a whopping 290,857 outstanding
work orders across it’s
172,469 units.
“There is one landlord that gets
special ringing at the top, and that
is The New York City Housing
Authority,” he said. “The city
shouldn’t get away with having
290,000 work orders, over 100,000
from last year.”
Public Advocate Jumaane Williams revealed new report at
a recent Manhattan protest, showing that the city’s worst
landlord owns 13 buildings in Brooklyn.
Photo by Todd Maisel
Bill Clinton greets parishioners as an eco-friendly church in Bed-Stuy.
Photo by Todd Maisel
Bubba in Brooklyn!
Bill Clinton pays visit to Bed-Stuy holy house
By Ben Verde
Brooklyn Paper
The 42nd President of the
United States of America finally
made the trip out to Brooklyn on
Tuesday, when he visited a Bedford
Stuyvesant house of worship
that was recently retrofitted
with new green technology
funded through the Clinton Foundation.
The church, Cornerstone Baptist
Church on Madison Street
near Lewis Avenue received several
energy efficiency upgrades,
which President Bill Clinton
praised as essential in the fight
against climate change.
“This is a picture through
which we can see a better fu-
Park your bike in your local pod
Startup opens fi rst borough bike vault near Atlantic Terminal
By Ben Verde
Brooklyn Paper
In pod we trust!
Bike-riding Brooklynites finally
have a safe and dry place
to stow their ride if they want to
hop on the train at the borough’s
biggest transit hub, thanks to one
entrepreneur’s bike storage system.
Brooklyn’s first Oonee Pod, a
modular bicycle vault that debuted
in Manhattan last year, is open for
business outside Atlantic Terminal
in Fort Greene. The pod is the
brain-child of Shabazz Stuart, a
Crown Heights native who says
providing safe storage for those
who choose to move around the city
efficiently is the next step towards
becoming a 21st-century city.
“We need to start to treat those
who embrace and utilize mobility
alternatives as first-class citizens,”
Stuart said at the pods
opening on Friday.
Cyclists who want to stash their
ride can book a little peace of
mind through an app called Brivo
OnAir. Bike storage in the pod is
completely free of charge, according
to Oonee employees.
The pod business model relies
on leasing out the pods’ exterior
to advertisers, allowing
Stuart to keep the rack free for
cyclists, while providing something
with more aesthetic charm
than a strictly utilitarian parking
garage, Stuart told the Brooklyn
Paper in January.
The pod contains 20 racks,
includes e-bike charging, and
has plantings and phone chargers
on the outside, which Stuart
says helps it service the urban
environment in more ways
than just storing bikes.
“If this infrastructure is going
to thrive in cities and public
spaces, we need to think about
the folks who walk by it on a regular
basis,” he said.
None of this would have been
necessary though if Atlantic Yards/
Pacific Park developer Bruce Ratner
had followed through on his
promise to include 400 secure
bike parking spaces in the Barclays
Center Arena, as reported
by the Atlantic Yard/Pacific Park
report. Ratner opted instead to install
100 outdoor racks, including
44 a few feet from where Brooklyn’s
first Oonee now stands.
Shabazz Stuart
shows off the first
Oonee Pod in
Kings County. The
modular bike storage
unit is on Atlantic
Avenue near
Fort Greene Place,
across the street
from the Barclays
Center.
Photos by Ben Verde
Developer Two Trees plans to erect two towers 600-foot towers and build a new publicly accessible beach
park in Williamsburg. The developers plan to install a 3-acre waterfront park that will include two beaches
sheltered by a looping boardwalk and paths leading out to existing pier structures.
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