In the News: Hotel Threatens Brooklyn Bridge Park Plan

by Anne Schwartz, September, 1999

Brooklyn community groups have spent ten years laying the groundwork for a mile-long park along the East River. Now a proposed development may jeopardize their plans. Developer David Walentas (a.k.a. the DUMBO developer) has submitted a proposal for a regional entertainment and shopping center on a prime section of the waterfront (on land owned by the state and city). So far, his company has reached an interim agreement with the state, and the plan must now undergo the usual reviews. Opposing what it considers out-of-scale development, the Brooklyn Bridge Park Coalition--representing 60 civic and environmental groups--will soon come to the table with its own park-based plan.

Anne Sounds Off

What does Brooklyn really need: chain stores, parking garages, and a new hotel, or a green space with river access and picture-postcard bridge and skyline views? NYC is already a shopper's mecca. What New Yorkers crave is some breathing room, a connection with land and water and sky.