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To the editor:

The Feb. 7 article headlined “Mum’s The Word” rightly notes that the Downtown Brooklyn Plan is “the most complex rezoning plan in city history.” Unfortunately, the lead agencies, City Planning and the Economic Development Corporation, selected the plan’s submission date just prior to Christmas and New Year’s, effectively abbreviating the already scant 60 days available for community board evaluation.

If ultimately approved, the 22 proposals that constitute the Downtown Brooklyn Plan may forever transform the character of Brooklyn Heights, Boerum Hill, Cobble Hill, Concord Village and DUMBO/Vinegar Hill as the unintended consequence of the 14,000,000 square feet of new development they permit.

Noise, stress, traffic congestion, increased density and angry competition for scarce parking could dampen the strong sense of community, which so characterize our neighborhoods. The big losers could be us.

Not reassuringly, the draft environmental impact statement (DEIS) of the plan considers impacts from just half the potential build out (6,700,000 square feet). Yet even this impoverished study contains warnings of unmitigable congestion, and no evaluation of mass transit (the predominant mode of transportation for the thousands of potential new workers and visitors) except to oddly suggest widening one subway staircase.

The study concludes, “that the changes would not result in significant adverse impact in neighborhood character” (page S-23 of the Executive Summary, DEIS).

Unfortunately, this assertion only applies to the Downtown “core” study area containing just 1,200 residents (many of whom the plan removes through eminent domain, along with existing shops, school and historic buildings). But no mention of the potential change of the character of the neighborhoods of the 150,000 who live adjacent to the “core.”

Biblically, we are admonished, “Where there is no vision, the people perish” yet rather than with vision, we’re going into this with blinders on.

Critically absent are calculations of cumulative neighborhood impacts of those 14,000,000 square feet combined with those from Forest City Ratner’s proposed arena, the associated 4,500 Atlantic Yards housing units, the 2,500 apartments already being built or approved within five blocks of the “core,” the new Federal Courthouse, the several-million-square-foot proposed expansion at New York City Tech, Forest City’s 1,000,000 square feet of commercial space at Atlantic Terminal, etc.

The upshot is that Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff, on Jan. 23, confirmed that the Department of Transportation Economic development Corporation would “initiate a comprehensive transportation analysis, or ‘blueprint’ study, of Downtown Brooklyn. The scope of work … is being finalized and details will be made available to the local community by early February. Although the ‘blueprint’ study will not be completed before the Downtown Plan finishes ULURP, its findings will encompass all current traffic conditions as well as traffic impacts of future planned development.”

Far better to have had this new study’s conclusions before being asked to consider these massive zoning changes. And shouldn’t those who represent us urge the temporary withdrawal of these 22 zoning applications and their resubmission only after the study’s conclusions are public?

Often, those who urge caution are labeled as opponents of progress. Personally, I have consistently supported appropriate, contextual development and strongly encouraged economic growth as a CB2 member. Nevertheless, I also support the notion that meaningful planing requires that stakeholders understand and accept the consequences of proposed plans rather than a priori adopting them only to later learn the consequence.

The borough president’s hearing on the Downtown Brooklyn Plan is Feb. 18.

—Ken Diamondstone, CB2 member

©2004 The Brooklyn Paper