Are Brooklyn Heights Activists Looking $40M BBP Gift Horse In The Mouth?

By on May 3, 2012 4:09 pm in brooklyn bridge park, Brooklyn Heights, Government

Are Brooklyn Heights residents too haughty to share the neighborhood? That’s the tenor of a New York Post article today, which reports the melodramatic account of Tuesday night’s Brooklyn Park Planning meeting. Apparently, several civic leaders groused that the record-setting $40 million donation for a planned 115,000sf athletic facility would be “devastating” for the nabe.

The proposed year-round Fieldhouse near Pier 5 at the edge of Joralemon Street in Willowtown, received a full funding offer in April from Manhattan philanthropist Joshua Rechnitz, which would include an inclined bike track, sports playing areas, 2,500 seats and on-site parking. Rechnitz also agreed to underwrite any operating revenue shortfalls during the first decade of a 20-year city lease agreement.

But some activists Tuesday complained, saying the BBP attraction would draw crowds of unwanted pedestrians and traffic to the quiet streets of the neighborhood. Community Board 2 parks committee member Mary Goodman, who lives a few blocks away, protested, “This would be devastating to the southern Heights. [Joralemon] would become the secret way to get there faster, and in a street full of babies, dogs and people, it would be disastrous.”

Brooklyn Heights Assn. President Jane McGroarty and Linda DeRosa, VP of the Willowtown Assn., also bemoaned the influx of park-goers, according to the Post. Both groups intend to lobby the city to fence off Joralemon Street at the corner of Furman Street, preventing access to the park there. “It’s a very exciting project,” McGroarty said. “But if [the field house is] going to have 2,500 people, where are they going to come from?”

Addressing the concerns, Kate Collingnan, a rep for the nonprofit New York City Fieldhouse, stressed, “Certainly access and traffic will be things we look at” during the city’s environmental review process. In addition, Judi Francis, who has led a fight to keep high-rise condos out of the park, said the plan should be hailed, not lambasted, because it “finally fills the park’s biggest void,” a lack of year-round recreation: “The focus should be how fantastic this will be for all New Yorkers.”

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  • David on Middagh

    Fisaco! What a great coinage, CB. When words mutate just right, it’s magic.

  • carol

    i wasn’t sure what track cycling. I found this clip on utube. There are many more clips in case you get really hooked.

    http://youtu.be/MedBqoFPv-o

  • km

    What if they put a roof garden on it so it looked lovely from the promenade? At least then it would be vaguely nice to look at…

  • A Neighbor

    I would be willing to bet this is a Bloomberg deal. He can’t help himself — he thinks he knows what is best for us. My information is that the park board knew nothing about it until after it was a done deal.

  • my2cents

    I find it funny that people are concerned that there will be tons of car traffic due to a velodrome…wouldn’t it stand to reason that the majority of people who go there to use or spectate at such a facility will come by bike? I can’t wait to watch track bike races there, personally.

  • BH’er

    I agree that a guy with $40M in his pocket shouldn’t be able to just walk along and impact the lives of thousands of residents to suit his own interests

    It would be detrimental to our community to have the ebb and flow of 2,500 ‘spectators’ moving through the neighborhood – and they wouldn’t create much good.

    Provide more business – probably. But worth it – probably not. Not if you consider the peripheral effects – noisy groups, trash, blocked sidewalks.

    And for what? So they can have a velodrome/roller rink? The park should provide for the interests of the local community and be open to all.

    The promenade already draws a lot of people, who can be disruptive – loud music from cars, limos and tour buses blocking streets, etc.

    It would be great to have a year-round facility. I would love that – but it should meet the needs of the community. This is not the Barclays Center and people visiting would greatly impact our neighborhood.

    I hope we think carefully about this and am thankful for the Jane McGroarty’s and others that look out for our great neighborhood!!

  • BH’er

    @my2cents – exactly – loads of race bikes coming over the already crowded bridges/walkways and racing through our streets does not make this a better place to live.

    It’s not just cars, but bikes that may not be a positive addition to our area.

    Velodrome and sports center for the community – great!

    2,500 seats – maybe not so necessary?

  • Gerry

    We need an indooor pool an Aquatics Center in downtown Brooklyn like Asphalt Green on the east side of Manhattan we need a pool that is 50 meters long 15 geet deep open from 5am to 11pm 7 days per week..

  • WillowSt.Neighbor

    BH’er,
    “The park should provide for the interests of the local community and be open to all.”
    Well said. My sentiments exactly.

  • BH’er

    something interesting to note on this topic is that Asphalt Green is opening a location in BPC later this month or early June

    This will bring a great facility and programming in the model of the UES, which is a tremendous asset to the community

    The AG and Chelsea Piers facilities operations and neighborhood impact should be examined closely. These are tremendous facilities that provide so much to the city – it would be great to have a similar addition to BBP, but hopefully well planned and meant to serve the community and city, not just the personal interests of the well to do

  • Sashimi Tekkamaki

    What elitist nonsense. I live in Dumbo near the entrance to the park. Thousands of people walk by my front door every weekend day. We survive quite nicely. Those Joralemon Street whiners should get over themselves. Fast.

  • She’s Crafty

    OK please. Enough with the bikes already! I’ll become more enthusiastic when I see more bikers actually obeying traffic rules and wearing helmets. Otherwise, forget it. NYC is not a bike centric city and I hope it never becomes one if the bikers behave the way most of them do now. By the way, I never see other bikers holding fellow bikers up to traffic rules. Start doing that and then maybe the rest of us will take you seriously.

  • David on Middagh

    She’s Crafty,

    Why should bicyclists of legal age wear helmets? Motorists are allowed to suffer head injuries. Why shouldn’t bicyclists?

    And why should bicyclists hold other bicyclists–strangers, that is–to the traffic rules? Do motorists do this, except to shout at the motorist who just cut them off?

    FTR, I am not particularly in favor of a giant velodrome. But if a velodrome takes the racers out of Prospect Park (is that still a problem?) it may be worth… something.

  • She’s Crafty

    David – in answer to all your questions, because bicyclists are constantly complaining about their “lot” and also, because riding a bike is different than riding in a car re: head injury risk. Motorcyclists are required to wear helmets in NYS for this reason too.

    Also: rogue bicyclists cause injuries to themselves and others yet they aren’t required to have liability insurance.

    They should hold other bicyclists to traffic rules if they want to be taken seriously, which they are constantly complaining that no one does. And while I’m on this subject, the tourists who rent bikes down at BBP have absolutely no idea of the rules of the road and no one tells them, so they ride on the sidewalk and the walking paths in the park which presents a risk to pedestrians. I am SO sick of bikes!!

  • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlsiLOnWCoI Arch Stanton

    Dear She’s Crafty,
    I take it you didn’t participate in yesterdays 5 Borough Bike Tour?

    How exactly, are cyclists supposed to “hold other bicyclists to traffic rules” if they are not law enforcement? Do you as a pedestrian hold other pedestrians to the rules, prevent them from J walking or crossing against the light? Do you obey all the rules ?

  • She’s Crafty

    @Arch, no I didn’t, and it completely screwed up the plans I had for the day actually.

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