Pierhouse: Still Growing on Brooklyn Bridge Park Pier 1

We’re not reporting “facts” as “opinions”. That is unless you think Ms. Myer’s comment in the linked article is an opinion.

Boycott the Behemoth.

Really? Are you seriously denying that the way you phrased that line didn’t clearly imply that whether or not it is in the view plane is up for debate? Come on.

Your link doesn’t show the hotel is out of the scenic view plane. It only shows the parameters of the view plane. One must go to the Promenade with surveying equipment to verify if the hotel is in violation. So yes, it is debatable.
Also as I recall, the developers said they
weren’t going to build the hotel any taller than the buildings that were previously there, They appear to have ignored that “promise”.

Plane or no plane, the truly sad part is that the bridge is no longer seen in context, spanning the body of water it was meant to transverse. From the pic referenced, it looks like a bridge over PierHouse. Just saying’…

Hubris of our generation to think we have the right to do this. It is higher than the already thoughtless structure that was there before. This is not social progress! Where is the planning foresight? bBP is a great park, but that does not disallow criticism of legitimate failures.

I don’t think most people have any idea how bad this is going to get. Much more than just the bridge view is going to be blocked.

Some months ago I uploaded photos to the Wednesday Open Thread of this blog. They were photos I’d just taken of the construction site. On the photos, I’d drawn lines to show my estimate of the amount of view that would be blocked when the condos are completed.

From that estimate, if we draw a line from the roof-line of the condos already built and extend that roof-line to the position to the south where they will end, the roofline will be so high that we’ll soon have to kiss goodbye the views of the Pier 1 part of the park (including the attractive pilings in the river) as well as a substantial amount of skyline. That would be when standing on the northern sections of the Promenade, past Orange Street. The further north one goes, the more blockage.

The only response I got here was a dispute of my estimate from someone who I suspect is involved with the project.

I can’t believe that city officials are allowing this to happen.

It’s repulsive

Has anyone bothered to read the document that established the “Special Scenic View District,” i.e., the fan-shaped view from the Brooklyn Heights Promenade, to find out whether it mentions the view of the entire height of the western half of Brooklyn Bridge as being protected? Furthermore, given the post-Sandy mandate governing new construction in a flood zone, who expects ANY developer from sacrificing income-producing floors to accommodate mechanical installations. Would you, if you were an investor? I think a reality check is in order.

I would expect, even as an investor, that the law and regulation be complied with. That is the right thing to do.

There was an agreement, subscribed to by the BBPC, that no building on the Pier 1 site would impede the view of the Brooklyn Bridge, even though outside the designated view plane, any more than did the National Cold Storage Warehouse building that stood there before. When it became necessary to move the mechanicals of the Pier House to the top after Sandy, no doubt the developer confronted BBPC management with an ultimatum: this agreement had to be scrapped; otherwise, the developer would be forced to abandon the hotel project and the Park would be denied substantial revenue as well as the presence of a hotel, which the Park’s management wanted very much. Despite the BBPC’s, in my opinion, disingenuous claim that the “community” was given full notice of the implications of moving the mechanicals to the top of the building, the fact that the Brooklyn Heights Association and Otis Pearsall, who was instrumental in negotiating the agreement that was scrapped, were unaware of it makes this claim seem very dubious. BBPC has also used what I consider three red herring arguments: that the previously established view plane hasn’t been obstructed (irrelevant because the agreement specifically dealt with what was outside the view plane); that the structure housing the mechanicals complies with the City’s building code (irrelevant because it ignores the agreement); and that the previously existing warehouse structure also blocked part of the view of the Bridge from the Promenade (true if you’re at the north end of the Promenade; the view the agreement sought to protect was from its south end).

This is all the sad result of our unwillingness, as a polity, to provide adequate funding for public goods, such as parks, schools, libraries, and hospitals. This leaves us dependent on public-private partnerships, in which private interests always seem to hold the upper hand, to the detriment of the rest of us.

This is New York City — so many view end up getting blocked by progress. Why care if some of the view is blocked from the precious promenade? Back when they were building it, nobody even wanted it…

Your idea of “progress” is idiosyncratic, and, yes, the Promenade is precious.

The document you have referred to is irrelevant to the issue. There is a separate agreement, entered into in 2005, that is intended to protect a view of the Brooklyn Bridge that is not included in the “scenic view plane.” There’s more information here: http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/70634

Claudia – my comment was in response to ujh’s question about the original definition of the Special Scenic View District’s stipulations. The special scenic view district will be controlling should the 2005 agreement fail.