Five years ago, the City Council considered a proposal to rezone Brooklyn’s Industry City. For those who have not been to Industry City in Sunset Park – please visit. It is a fantastic development – developers turned old warehouse buildings into a vibrant center of food, art, industry, technology and shopping. In 2017, the developers proposed an ambitious expansion, a change in zoning rules to allow for hotels, educational facilities, workforce development, additional retail and media, technology and a significant number of new jobs
But the local City Council member led a successful effort to derail the rezoning, fearing the development would gentrify the largely immigrant Sunset Park community and that its residents would only have access to the lower wage jobs. It was one more marker in the graveyard of missed development opportunities.
New Yorkers are a hearty and resilient people. We all live here because it is a phenomenal city, vibrant, bursting with creativity, talent and opportunity. We make sacrifices and deal with inconveniences so that we get to live here. But one set of sacrifices we New Yorkers have not been willing to make has been any changes to our own communities – growth.
Protests rise quickly to block tall buildings in low rise neighborhoods. Rezoning for greater density faces steep opposition. And it is not limited to New York City. Upstate communities have organized to stop the use of open spaces for wind or solar farms. We love economic development, and we want more housing and renewable energy, just not in our backyards.
We saw this with Westway in the 1970s and more recently with the Amazon HQ2 project. Atlantic Yards in Brooklyn faced years of delay from lawsuits and protests. Twenty years in, multiple residential buildings still are waiting to be built. Governor Hochul’s 2022 proposal for Transit Oriented Development and housing growth in the suburbs met an impenetrable wall of opposition. The unbuilt and blockaded projects would create a dazzling and modern city, and improve housing and our economy around the state, had they been given the chance.
But there are signs that times are changing. The days when a handful of elected officials or neighborhood groups can single-handedly block a project or zoning change may never be fully in the past. Yet, there is a heightened recognition of the need to balance the greater good with the interests of individual communities. The progressive City Council’s enactment of the City of Yes, a rezoning to provide for more dense housing, was a strong indicator of this growing understanding.
What kinds of projects and possibilities could take advantage of this new emerging consensus for growth?
Developers could make another go at Industry City, Atlantic Yards needs a new push, and New York City is making its third attempt to develop the Kingsbridge Armory in the Bronx. In Queens, Sunnyside Yards can provide ample housing, and there are signs of life at the Amazon HQ2 site in Long Island City. Staten Island’s north shore is prime for development. There are also multiple proposals for downstate casinos, some of them grand, promising revenue for the State and good jobs for New Yorkers. Communities across the State could embrace rather than chase away wind, solar and other alternative energy investments.
To be sure, we do not want to go back to the days of Robert Moses, when entire neighborhoods were bulldozed, and residents were sent to the far reaches of the outer boroughs. Communities have legitimate concerns, especially communities of color. New Yorkers rightly will insist that development produces good jobs and good wages. Every project deserves scrutiny, and not all should go forward. But there is a difference between addressing concerns and stopping progress. Cities and states that do not grow, stagnate. We cannot let the Sunbelt be the country’s economic engine and future.
City and State leaders have an opportunity today to embrace growth and progress. A visitor to London, Austin, Pheonix, or Shanghai will notice that there are so many cranes – buildings are going up. A few more cranes in and around New York would be a good sign that New York is on the rise.
Elizabeth Fine is former counsel to Gov. Kathy Hochul and is principal of Liz Fine Advisory LLC.
