Judge's decision on NYU expansion puts Willets Point project into question

From the Daily News:

New York University's $6 billion expansion plan all-but-collapsed Tuesday when a Manhattan judge ruled that construction cannot start unless the state legislature agrees that three tiny strips of city parkland can be used for the project.

“The legislature will never go for that,” Randy Mastro, the lawyer for the opponents, predicted Tuesday night as New York University officials mulled Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Donna Mills’ 78-page decision.

Mills rejected all the other arguments of the opponents — who included Greenwich Village celebrity residents like Matthew Broderick — but she agreed that they were right about the misuse of three tiny strips of land used as parks.

City lawyers had contended that they didn't need the legislature's permission to give the parkland to NYU because the strips were not dedicated parkland and are still on city maps as streets.

But opponents said these strips have been treated as official parks by the city for decades; they have used as parks by area residents; and they are on city websites as parks tended by the Parks Department.

“Land can become parkland ‘either through express provision such as restrictions in a deed or legislative enactment, or by implied acts, such as continued use of the parcel as park,’” Mills wrote.

“Land may become parkland by implication even...where the land remains mapped for another purpose, as here,” she added, ruling that for the city to give the property to NYU without the legislature's approval would violate the ‘public trust doctrine.’

So parkland is parkland? What an original concept! So this most likely means that the former site of Shea Stadium will be considered parkland. Tee hee!