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February 14-20, 2020
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The mayor threw his hat into the “Fight for Sunlight” controversy for the fi rst time Friday. Photo by Continuum Company
GROWING PAINS
Wreck-less
City Council
passes bill to curb
reckless drivers
Mayor supports development poised to devastate Botanic Garden
BY BEN VERDE
Now he’s a gardener too!
Mayor Bill de Blasio undermined
the expert opinion
of professional green thumbs,
architects, and executives
at Brooklyn Botanic Garden
during an appearance on the
Brian Lehrer show on Feb.
7, when he suggested that
building a massive residential
complex a stones throw
away from the beloved horticultural
“It really broke the hearts
museum would
Continued on page 16 Continued on page 16
cause no serious injury to its
collection of rare and exotic
plants.
“I don’t think it ruins the
garden forever, I just don’t,”
Hizzoner said.
Garden stewards have
maintained a fi rm opposition
to the proposed megadevelopment
at 960 Franklin
Ave. — a mixed-use complex
containing 1,578 residential
units, half of which would
be offered at so-called “affordable”
rates — since the
project was unveiled in 2018,
with executives fearing the
destruction of plant life as a
result of shadows cast by the
development’s 39-story towers.
Their concerns are supported
by shadow studies
conducted by two architectural
fi rms at the behest of
local anti-gentrifi cation advocates,
which demonstrated
that the towers would subject
critical areas within the garden
— including the Steinhardt
Conservatory, home
to 18,500 plants — to hours of
additional gloom per day.
But the most damning testimony
against the development
came during a hearing
of the City Planning Commission
in March, 2019, when
Rowan Blaik, director of living
collections at Brooklyn
Botanic Garden, stated that
shadows cast by 960 Franklin
Ave. would radically undermine
Brooklyn Botanic’s
ability to breed new plants,
BY BEN VERDE
Kings County speed demons
will soon be forced to
take a driving safety course,
or risk having their cars impounded,
after Council passed
a landmark piece of legislation
on Tuesday.
The bill — which was sponsored
by Councilman Brad
Lander (D—Park Slope) in the
wake of a devastating 2018 car
crash that killed two children
— will force motorists who
accrue 15 speed camera violations,
or fi ve red light violations
within a 12-month span
to complete a 90-minute road
safety course, or else their vehicles
will be booted.
Colloquially known as the
Reckless Driver Accountability
Act, the bill will help prevent
the most predictable traffi
c-related fatalities, Lander
said at a Tuesday morning
press conference at City Hall.
“It’s intuitive that the most
reckless drivers are disproportionately
likely to injure
or kill other New Yorkers, but
it is not something yet that
any city or any state is really
focusing on,” the Councilman
said.
The Park Slope legislator,
and city comptroller candidate,
has championed the
idea since March 2018, when
a woman with a history of
unsafe driving fatally struck
1-year-old Joshua Lew and
4-year-old Abigail Blumenstein
at the intersection of
Ninth Street and Fifth Avenue.
Blumenstein’s mother,
Ruthie Ann Miles, later miscarried
as a result of her injuries.
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