From the Brooklyn Paper:Borough President Markowitz’s controversial plan for an amphitheater in a Coney Island park will seize nearly three-quarters of the park’s already insufficient area for active recreation.
The $64-million concert venue in Asser Levy Seaside Park along Surf Avenue between Ocean Parkway and W. Fifth Street will commandeer the vast majority of the two-football-field-sized main green with a large concrete seating area and a gradually sloping lawn that will rise up to 21 feet.
As a result, the active recreation space in the park — currently about 2-1/2 acres — will shrink to less than one acre.
And park users are not happy.
The city says that it hasn’t decided exactly what kinds of activities will be permitted on the elevated lawn — intended as a viewing area for outdoor concerts — but sports certainly won’t be one of them.
When the field is replaced, the closest similar field will be at Kaiser Park, located on the western end of Coney Island between West 23rd street and Bayview Avenue, about 1-1/2 miles away.
Meanwhile, the city has already begun soliciting operators for the proposed amphitheater — ahead of a required Environmental Assessment which has yet to be completed.
Parks Department officials insist that active recreational programming — including everything from a skate park to an ice-skating rink — will still be possible underneath the amphitheater’s roof when concerts are not being staged. But there are no guarantees: The venue’s $64-million pricetag won’t cover the cost of creating those facilities, however.
3 comments:
And local pols are silent. Which is to be expected.
Reading the local Russian papers, there is more concern about a mosque being built in Sheepshead Bay than the Potato chip in Seaside Park.
Look, we're in America, and freedom of religion will allow the mosque to be built, but the Potato Chip can be prevented.
If only the local Russian community gets its priorities right.
BP Marty Markowitz & his 2 Amigos ... Councilman Recchia, State Senator Carl Kruger, are pushing this vanity project like crazy!
I know this Amphitheater is Marty's Dream & the residents Nightmare but it is almost as if this is Marty's & his 2 Amigos lifetime annunity fund.
I think the NYS Attorney General Coumo should open up an investigation about the process that is being done here.
It sounds awfully like the Aqueduct deal. All Rotten!!
Follow the money!
Just wait till Clear Channel flashes big $$ and get's in there.
It will be 2 1/2 acres for corporate signage, booths and parking ALONE.
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