The developer of the Atlantic Yards project in New York's Brooklyn borough plans to borrow about $100 million to construct an apartment tower near the basketball arena now going up on Flatbush Avenue, according to an article at bloomberg.net today by David M. Levitt and Betty Liu.
Work should start on the apartment building in December or January, Bruce Ratner, Forest City Ratner Cos. chairman and chief executive officer, said today in an interview on Bloomberg Television. "The tower would join the Barclays Center sports arena as the second structure at the $4.9 billion, 22-acre project in downtown Brooklyn," the article said.
"We've already talked to banks and we will be able to get a loan," Ratner said.
The master plan for Atlantic Yards calls for about 6,400 units of housing, 30 percent of them reserved for low- and middle-income tenants.
Ratner is considering plans for a tower with about 400 apartments, using prefabricated boxes containing floors, plumbing, bathrooms and kitchens that would be hoisted into place by cranes, according to a March 18, 2011 article in The New York Times by Charles V. Bagli that said "in a bid to cut costs at his star-crossed Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn, the developer Bruce C. Ratner is pursuing plans to erect the world's tallest prefabricated steel structure, a 34-story tower that would fulfill his obligation to start building affordable housing at the site."
That article said that "the prefabricated, or modular, method he would use, which is untested at that height, could cut construction costs in half by saving time and requiring substantially fewer and cheaper workers. And the large number of buildings planned for the $4.9 billion Atlantic Yards - 16 in all, not including the Nets arena now under construction - could also make it economical for the company to run its own modular factory, where walls, ceilings, floors, plumbing and even bathrooms and kitchens could be installed in prefabricated steel-frame boxes."
The company, the article continued, has also continued to design a conventional tower. Forest City hired Ove Arup & Partners, a prominent engineering firm, for the modular work, while SHoP Architects is working on designs for both types of buildings.
The modular construction, however, would "infuriate the construction workers who were Mr. Ratner's most ardent supporters during years of stormy community meetings, where they drowned out neighborhood opponents with chants of, 'Jobs, jobs, jobs,'" Mr. Bagli's article said.
The state and the city agreed to provide $300 million in direct subsidies for Atlantic Yards, in part, because Forest City insisted that the project would generate "upwards of 17,000 union construction jobs."
Not to worry, MaryAnne Gilmartin, executive vice president of Forest City Ratner, said, "We're a union shop, and we build union," the article said.
Under an agreement with the state, Forest City must begin excavation by May 2013, or pay up to $5 million in penalties for every year it falls behind.
The Barclays Center, to be home of the National Basketball Association's Nets who now play in Newark, New Jersey, is on schedule for a Sept. 28, 2012, grand opening, Ratner said.
Under current wage scales, union workers earn less in a factory than they do on-site. A carpenter earns $85 an hour in wages and benefits on-site, but only $35 an hour in a factory.
Work should start on the apartment building in December or January, Bruce Ratner, Forest City Ratner Cos. chairman and chief executive officer, said today in an interview on Bloomberg Television. "The tower would join the Barclays Center sports arena as the second structure at the $4.9 billion, 22-acre project in downtown Brooklyn," the article said.
"We've already talked to banks and we will be able to get a loan," Ratner said.
The master plan for Atlantic Yards calls for about 6,400 units of housing, 30 percent of them reserved for low- and middle-income tenants.
Ratner is considering plans for a tower with about 400 apartments, using prefabricated boxes containing floors, plumbing, bathrooms and kitchens that would be hoisted into place by cranes, according to a March 18, 2011 article in The New York Times by Charles V. Bagli that said "in a bid to cut costs at his star-crossed Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn, the developer Bruce C. Ratner is pursuing plans to erect the world's tallest prefabricated steel structure, a 34-story tower that would fulfill his obligation to start building affordable housing at the site."
That article said that "the prefabricated, or modular, method he would use, which is untested at that height, could cut construction costs in half by saving time and requiring substantially fewer and cheaper workers. And the large number of buildings planned for the $4.9 billion Atlantic Yards - 16 in all, not including the Nets arena now under construction - could also make it economical for the company to run its own modular factory, where walls, ceilings, floors, plumbing and even bathrooms and kitchens could be installed in prefabricated steel-frame boxes."
The company, the article continued, has also continued to design a conventional tower. Forest City hired Ove Arup & Partners, a prominent engineering firm, for the modular work, while SHoP Architects is working on designs for both types of buildings.
The modular construction, however, would "infuriate the construction workers who were Mr. Ratner's most ardent supporters during years of stormy community meetings, where they drowned out neighborhood opponents with chants of, 'Jobs, jobs, jobs,'" Mr. Bagli's article said.
The state and the city agreed to provide $300 million in direct subsidies for Atlantic Yards, in part, because Forest City insisted that the project would generate "upwards of 17,000 union construction jobs."
Not to worry, MaryAnne Gilmartin, executive vice president of Forest City Ratner, said, "We're a union shop, and we build union," the article said.
Under an agreement with the state, Forest City must begin excavation by May 2013, or pay up to $5 million in penalties for every year it falls behind.
The Barclays Center, to be home of the National Basketball Association's Nets who now play in Newark, New Jersey, is on schedule for a Sept. 28, 2012, grand opening, Ratner said.
Under current wage scales, union workers earn less in a factory than they do on-site. A carpenter earns $85 an hour in wages and benefits on-site, but only $35 an hour in a factory.
Architecture Critic
Carter Horsley
Since 1997, Carter B. Horsley has been the editorial director of CityRealty. He began his journalistic career at The New York Times in 1961 where he spent 26 years as a reporter specializing in real estate & architectural news. In 1987, he became the architecture critic and real estate editor of The New York Post.
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