Atlantic Yards is a huge undertaking, redeveloping 22 acres in Downtown Brooklyn. Some argue that the project is a benefit to the community, providing jobs and affordable housing while others make the claim that the redevelopment will be overwhelming and take up a lot of space. I agree with Nicole Gelina’s argument, who talks about the failures of central planning and for those reasons I mainly oppose the redevelopment of Atlantic Yards.

I had not heard of this redevelopment project until reading about it recently and I was surprised to learn that it is being planned by architect Frank Gehry. Known for his beautiful and surreal buildings, Gehry already has two well known buildings in Manhattan; the luxury apartment skyscraper on 8 Spruce Street and IAC/InterActiveCorp’s headquarters on the West side. While I admire Gehry’s talent, I am opposed to the notion of central planning. Though knowing his excellent work, I am sure the Atlantic Yards redevelopment project will at least be aesthetically pleasing.

The Atlantic Yards project required taking private property away from residents in order to get land to build. The buildings and “half-million-dollar apartments” were labeled as being blighted, though “the city had already designated part of the neighborhood as “blighted” 40 years earlier, long before its resurgence” (Gelinas). Residents of the neighborhood, looking to keep their homes, have lost those lawsuits, with the court “abdicat[ing] its duty to protect property owners from the governor” (Gelinas). I greatly disagree that the government has the right to take away private property for the sake of the public for redevelopment projects. Gelinas makes a good point when she states, “Whenever government fails to confine itself to a limited role in the economy, it creates similar uncertainty.” These uncertainties often create incentives for people to take unnecessary risks, knowing the government will be providing support if something goes wrong, or create a lack of incentives to invest or upkeep infrastructure stemmed from artificial “low income” rent pricing.

While Kent Barwick also opposes the redevelopment of Atlantic Yards, I don’t quite agree with his arguments. He seems to think that the Atlantic Yards will “overwhelm the surrounding neighborhoods” and says the buildings will be large and take up a lot of space. I don’t find this a negative aspect of the project. In fact, this may be the only positive element of the Atlantic Yards. Gehry is a talented architect who probably has an interesting design for a large building. Barwick also seems to think that large buildings will turn out as “tall, deadening towers,” yet tall buildings can be built with storefronts facing the streets as well. Large buildings in Manhattan have a multitude of shops and stores on their lower levels, making the streets inviting to walk upon.

Thus the size of the buildings and height are irrelevant. If a private company was building large buildings for market-rate housing or offices, there would be no reason to complain. The residents would have the right to remain in their houses or chose to sell to the private developer, who would have the highest incentives to create an attractive and safe project to attract residents. This is not the case with this redevelopment of the Atlantic Yards. Using eminent domain or claims of blighted neighborhoods to take private land, the government is forcing this project onto the neighborhood.

Upon first reading the description of Atlantic Yards, I believed it would be a huge benefit to the Brooklyn community. However, after viewing the opposition’s perspective on the construction of Atlantic Yards, I am not so sure I would fully support the project. The economic benefits the project would bring sounds extremely enticing to me, as someone who has never even been near the area; However, for people who live in the community, this project is an enormous gavel pounding down their homes and dreams. The main issue of this project appears to be eminent domain; does the government have the right to take private property to build this project for “public use?”

If the Atlantic Yards project does go through, it would bring in a lot of jobs, families, housing, and profit to the area. As their site mentions, the project will bring in $5 billion in tax revenues in the next 30 years, 8,000 permanent jobs, and 6,430 units of housing. In addition, there will be other benefits to the people of the community. For example, the construction of the arena they plan to build will have certain reservations for people of the community, such as certain tickets set aside for community use. The description and plan for this project sounds extremely appealing. I would be interested in moving into a community like that actually. It seems like a convenient place to live, and sounds like a mini city. There is no doubt that the area would bring in a lot of profit, especially since there is a variety of public transportation nearby.

Although Atlantic Yards would provide huge economic benefits to the community and the state, for the people living in the area already, this project is a nightmare. Not only will they have to give up their homes and find new affordable places to live, they have to give up memories attached to the homes. In addition, many small businesses will have to close down just for this project. If that is their source of income, how will business owners make money after shutting down for the construction of this project? Although Atlantic Yards considers the community, at the same time it does not consider the community. The community consists of the people who are already living there, but it appears that this project excludes the people living there who are taking up the space of where the project would be using. As the government is supporting this project, they are also ignoring people of the community, which they should be helping. I think that the opinions of those vastly affected by Atlantic Yards do not matter to the government or the company due to the large revenue it will bring in.

City Journal brings up many valid points on whether the city has the right to take away private property and replace it with Atlantic Yards. Two main points I thought could possibly overturn the case for allowing Atlantic Yards to be constructed were the definitions for “blight” and “public use.” The first word, “blight,” was used to refer to bad conditions in the neighborhood. The company’s reason for allowing this project to be built was that the neighborhood was in unseemly quality with ‘unpainted walls and loose awnings.’ However, if one were to actually live in the area, he/she would notice that the neighborhood is not in terrible shape as the company depicts it as. Thus, there needs to be a standard of what is considered “blight.” Once this standard is created, people against Atlantic Yards may have a chance of disputing against its construction.

In addition, another word requires a strict definition, which may determine the approval or disapproval of Atlantic Yards: “public use.” Is the construction of Atlantic Yards considered public use? In my perspective, I do not think you can consider this project public use. My idea of public use is a non-profit facility open to the public or a facility absolutely necessary for the public. New York law appears to be very flexible with the word “public use” as it appears anything is possible as long as there is just compensation. However, from the cases against the construction of the Atlantic Yards, it appears that he law is too focused on the meaning of what blight, when they should also be considering the meaning of public use. With my definition of public use, the construction of Atlantic Yards would not be possible.

The book, Mega-Projects: The Changing Politics of Urban Public Investment, discusses different methods of funding public projects. In all honesty, I really didn’t understand the private investment aspect. What I got from it is that American cities fight for private investors’ money in order to support the projects necessary to revitalize them. If that is correct, then I find it pretty awful that cities have to compete for these things. It appears that the government refrained from helping because it received negative feedback when it did so, but I don’t see why. This is something that I think is the government’s responsibility, so I don’t understand why people wouldn’t want the help. It’s actually not the government’s fault, but having the cities battle it out for investors is just ridiculous.

However, it seems that cities are perfectly capable of attaining this funding. Once that happens, the main focus becomes the actual construction. Recently, cities have been building expressways in areas with little to no urban development. As expected, there has been criticism: it encourages the expansion of cities and increases traffic. However, people also dislike when expressways are built through areas that are already urbanized. Somebody is unhappy either way, but I think it’s best to build the expressways before the urbanization occurs. In the long run, it works out better for everyone to grow a city around this central structure instead of forcing it into the middle of something that is already established and functions well. This complies with the “do no harm” paradigm, and its potential problems probably would’ve happened anyway.

Something that violates the “do no harm” rule, on the other hand, is the renovation of the Woodrow Wilson Bridge. It involves the displacement of 300 residential apartments, but it services a lot of people and companies. This brings up the question of if it’s okay to sacrifice a little in order to gain a lot. It sounds reasonable, but I’m sure that the people being moved out of their homes don’t feel that way. I think the “do no harm” clause is great. There must be other ways to go about building or rebuilding structures that avoid harming people in the process. This “do no harm” concept can definitely be followed, so it should absolutely be enforced.

The criticisms of these mega-projects really made me think about how cities avoid expansion. With New York City, the population has steadily risen over time, yet the allocated space for the city has hardly increased, and not nearly at the same rate if it has at all. This would mean that cities just have to recycle their land over and over again whenever they start to run out of space. How do planners come up with new ways to do this all the time? Will there ever be a point where they can’t continue? Is there a backup plan for when that happens?

This book focuses on the mega-projects of the twentieth century. Now in the twenty-first century, there don’t seem to be as many. This is mostly because they have become increasingly expensive, but I also think it has to do with the fact that so many things have already been built. There isn’t really a need for another airport or highway in most American cities; they are all doing just fine with what they have as of now. Since we no longer need new transportation facilities, we have turned to creating space intended for living and recreation. Mega-projects have just changed in nature, and they are fortunately still happening profusely.