Four years after the Bloomberg administration allowed IKEA to turn a historic dry dock in Red Hook into a parking lot, a new study has found that the city desperately needs at least seven new docks just like the one it gave up. IKEA BERTH PANGS: CITY DOCK DEAL A $1B BLUNDER
The city-commissioned study, conducted by SUNY Maritime College, urges the construction of seven new dry docks by 2016. Three must be "graving docks," such as the paved-over one in Red Hook, which can accommodate larger ships.
Industry experts say it would cost about $1 billion just to replace the 730-foot-long former graving dock that was converted into part of a parking lot for the IKEA store, which opened Wednesday.
City officials said they had to rely on outdated data from the previous maritime study, done in 1991, when approving the IKEA project in 2004, adding that the new report was long overdue.
I guess commissioning a new study to find out the needs of the city BEFORE approving the plan would have been too much to ask... But then again, that's how the entire city is being developed. Build now, worry about the consequences later. At least we'll have a big box furniture store that sells cheaply-made pressed-board crap to fall back on.
3 comments:
On IKEA:
"At least we'll have a big box furniture store that sells cheaply-made pressed-board crap to fall back on."
It's so true. I can't believe people furnish their homes with this junk.
The city has some two miles of waterfront between Gowanus and Bay Ridge that can be transformed into a seaport, as well as the piers of Staten Island.
"construction of seven new dry docks by 2016"
We're down one. Starting off in a hole. Bad planning. Maybe we should have been building this seaport over the last 7 years instead of luxury condos. Especially when you consider that the only evacuation plan we'll have in case of emergency, as city of islands, is by water.
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