BY KEVIN DUGGAN
Residents living around
the Pacifi c Park mega-development
in Prospect Heights are
wary of a new 455-space parking
garage being built near the
Barclays Center arena, claiming
developers and their allies
in state government have
failed to prepare the neighborhood
for the infl ux of hundreds
of additional cars.
“You’re degrading that environment
— without developing
a plan,” said Prospect Heights
resident Peter Krashes.
Manhattan development
fi rm TF Cornerstone is working
in partnership with Empire
State Development — the
state’s economic-development
arm — to install the massive,
subterranean lot beneath two
upcoming residential towers
located on Dean Street between
Carlton and Vanderbilt avenues.
The new garage would
be accessible via the single entrance
to an existing 303-space
parking facility located near
Carlton Avenue, and would
cause traffi c on the already
narrow, one-way artery to devolve
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into gridlock, according
to residents at a community
meeting on Tuesday.
“If you’re anticipating approximately
800 more cars to an
area that’s already extremely
congested, what provisions are
being made to address the addition
of 800 cars to what’s already
an extremely congested
area,” said Daphne Eviatar at
the bi-monthly “quality of life”
meeting hosted by the state
agency’s project task force, the
Atlantic Yards Community Development
Corporation.
That question was asked
over and over at Tuesday’s
meeting, but representatives
for the Empire Development
Corporation struggled to provide
an answer. One liaison
for the state agency claims that
the issue has already been the
focus of adequate study, and
that actions have been taken
to “mitigate” the effects of
hundreds of additional cars.
The rep did not, however, provide
specifi cs examples of what
measures have been taken.
“When the project was fi rst
approved in 2006 and 2009,
there was an analysis that was
done looking at what the traffi c
impact would be on the community
and mitigations have
been put in place,” said Tobi
Jaiyesimi, the state’s Pacifi c
Park project manager.
Spaces at the upcoming
parking garage will not be reserved
strictly for residents,
and Barclays-bound patrons
are expected to take advantage
of the new accommodations.
However, locals questioned the
wisdom of building additional
facilities for drivers in one the
borough’s most transit rich areas
— the Barclays Center is
serviced by nine subway lines
and the Long Island Railroad
— and one resident insisted
the garage would simply invite
more motorists into the area.
“Everybody knows that
Prospect Heights residents fear incoming traffi c chaos if developers
build a massive 455-space parking garage on Dean Street. Google
if you build parking, cars arrive
— that’s a simple vision of
any city planning,” said Louis
Galdieri.
Developers previously
planned three entrances for a
larger garage with 910 spaces
for the four-tower block, a 2014
environmental impact statement
shows, but the addition
of the gym may have led to the
reduction, local watchdog journalist
Norman Oder wrote in
his blog.
A spokesman for the state
agency would not answer why
the the state, or developers
scaled back the number of entrances
from three to one, saying
only that plans shown to
the public in 2014 were “illustrative,
not defi nite.”
Invasion of the cars!
Locals fear new, massive parking garage will fl ood
Prospect Heights with hundreds of automobiles
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