(The focus of my post consists of the first 5 minutes of the video above and is analyzed using the old scheduled readings as well as the updated scheduled readings)
The Atlantic Yards Porject, later renamed the Pacific Park project, was a project proposed by Bruce Ratner to build Barclay’s Center in the neighborhood of Fort Greene, Brooklyn. When Bruce Ratner was asked why Brooklyn was his choice of relocation of the Nets and the creation of the Stadium, his answer was everything but the way developers can exploit a neighborhood divided by race and class. Instead, as stated in Julie Sze’s, “Sports and Environmental Justice: “Games” of Race, Place, Nostalgia, and Power in Neoliberal New York City”, developers played upon the desolation of Brooklyn after the relocation of the Brooklyn Dodgers and promised to bring back the spirit of Brooklyn using the Brooklyn Nets (Sze, 118). In the interview Ratner also goes on to say that Brooklyn had the “bones” of a great city, meaning strong infrastructure, access to transportation and beautifully preserved residential areas. These pitches, for development in Fort Greene, would normally come as bad news for the underprivileged and lower class individuals living in the area yet accordign to Sze, the people in opposition to the development were often criticized for being upper class and elitist in their views. However, the consequent gentrification due to large-scale projects, such as Atlantic Yards, creates displacement of underprivileged people and outcomes far from what is promised by developers.
A development as big as the Atlantic Yards oftentimes means gentrification in the area undergoing the project which results in the displacement of those who are underpriveleged. Yet developers can paint a pretty picture to those that are underpriviliged through the constant promise of new jobs and perhabs affordable housing. The developers ability to maniuplate a public using Community Benefit Agreements (CBA’s) and to stir debate between class and race differences in the neighborhood plays out in the developers favor which perpetuated the success of Atlantic Yards. As Sze, states the rally’s over Atlantic Yards had a theme of “Black rage versus White privelege” and is usually the product of CBA’s. In this case, those who were speaking out against the Atlantic Yards projects were upper class White indivduals who did not need the work promised by the upcoming development. After the implementation of Atlantic Yards, however, Fort Greene became one of the most expensive neighborhoods in Brooklyn and is mostly populated by the upper class. The lower class individuals played right into the hands of the “job and benefit promising” developers to rally in support for the project. Naved Sheikh in, “Community Benefits Agreements: Can Private Contracts Replace Public Responsibility,” stated that Ratner’s development firm, Forest City Ratner, had manipulated the Atlantic Yards CBA in order to, “generate an appearance of public support to improve the project’s chances of approval.” (Sheikh, 231).
It is easy to listen to the inspiring reasons that many politicians and private developers give for picking certain areas in a city to develop while behind closed doors they know their reasons aren’t as superficial as the loss of a city’s spirit due to the relocation of a sports team. It’s important for the public to see beyond the pretty pictures painted by developers and politicians and to factually weigh the outcomes of large developments such as Atlantic Yards.
