An environmental study that needs to be completed before construction of the $150 million Brooklyn Bridge Park can begin has been stopped since at least February, a park official told The Brooklyn Papers this week.

Wendy Leventer, president of the Brooklyn Bridge Park Development Corporation, a subsidiary of the Empire State Development Corporation that was created to build the park, said the process of completing an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) been halted when she was appointed president in March.

The study will not resume until after Labor Day, she said, and will then take another year to complete.

Park planners originally hoped to see shovels in the ground this past spring for the start of construction on the 1.3-mile commercial and recreational development they hope will stretch along the waterfront from Jay Street south to Atlantic Avenue.

A Manhattan-based consulting firm was hired last year to complete the complex study, analyzing everything from traffic to shadows to air quality, but only completed the “existing conditions sections” before work stopped.

“Finishing the EIS is like the keys to the kingdom for getting the [project] done,” Leventer said this week. “So restarting that process is a major step towards realizing the park.”

The study was stopped because city and state funds had not come through, she said. When Leventer took the reins of the park development corporation, quietly replacing the former president, James Moogan, talk began to get serious about adding Pier 6 to the park. That pier has long been coveted by park planners because it provides a major thoroughfare as a gateway to the development — Atlantic Avenue.

Rather than completing a supplemental study for that portion of the park, which could have potentially stalled the development even longer, Leventer said she decided to wait and examine the project as a whole.

Community leaders this week said they were surprised to hear that a key component of the park plan had been stalled for this long.
“It’s disconcerting,” said Evan Thies, a spokesman for Councilman David Yassky. “We were told that the park would be built on a certain timetable and those expectations have not been met.”

The study will most likely not be completed until fall of next year.

Annual operation and maintenance costs of $15 million will be funded by revenue generated from commercial properties associated with the park including a hotel, restaurants and other pay-for-use recreational facilities, according to the park plan.

Among those are the Empire Stores, a row of brick, Civil War-era warehouses along Water Street in DUMBO, which real estate developer Shaya Boymelgreen plans to turn into a Chelsea Market-like complex of shops, galleries and offices as part of the development.

But Boymelgreen, who submitted the winning proposal to develop the site almost two years ago, cannot move ahead on the 300,000-square-foot project until the EIS is complete.

A spokesman for Boymelgreen could not be reached by press time.

Judy Stanton, executive director of the Brooklyn Heights Association, wasn’t disturbed by the delay.

“The most important thing is that a good job gets done and that it gets done in a most transparent way,” she said. “What I would not accept is actions done in secret and unnecessary delays that are politically motivated as opposed to operationally necessary.”

Samara Rifkin, a spokeswoman for the Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy, a pro-park alliance said she was pleased to see Pier 6 being incorporated.

“However,” she added, “we are very eager to see that the EIS process moves forward as quickly as possible.”

©2004 The Brooklyn Paper