Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Atlantic Yards = more tower people


From WNYC:

At 11:30, guest Nicole Gelinas says the following:
I think if the mayor really wanted development, he would concentrate on public transportation. All the mayor and the governor really want are warehouse apartments for people to live, pay very high personal income taxes for awhile, in their young 20, 30 years - and then move out of the city before they require public services, use the school system, and so forth. These are just going to be one bedroom "luxury" capped warehouses, and to knock down historic prewar buildings to build cheap construction warehouses for single people with roommates who'll be living here for a few years is just ridiculous. This is not free market. Free markets do not create this.

As transcribed by Atlantic Yards Report:

"When you look at the affordable housing component of this, we have hundreds of thousands of privately-owned affordable housing, out in Coney Island, out in the farther reaches of Brooklyn and the Bronx, but we have no reliable, fast transportation to get there," she said. "If the mayor and governor want affordable housing, build the infrastructure and the affordable housing will build itself. For people who say, oh no, the city has to build affordable housing directly. Well, we've been trying that, for a century, and we still don't have enough of it. Why don't we try it my way, just once, and see that it works."

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

It's all wishful thinking. Affordable housing is not a priority when it comes to development in the city. Everything built the past few years was luxury condos and towers. Any affordable housing still left in the city has been deregulated to make into Luxury apartments.

So I doubt the bullshit Atlantic Yards project will set aside apartments for middle and low income residents. The project will be passed off as "progress."

The mayor and BK boro president Marty Moose will take credit for bringing another useless project into the city under the guise of more jobs it will create.