Recent citywide projects like the mayor’s affordable-housing plan have reignited long-standing critiques of community boards—about the value of their advisory votes and how effective they are at reflecting the will of the diverse community districts they represent.
The city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission has the power to save valuable remnants of New York’s storied past. Yet it accepts the flimsiest arguments for tearing them down.
The disparities built into the city’s property tax system can be hard to fathom. So one architecture firm tried to tell the story in 3D.
Developers of the area formerly known as Atlantic Yards have offered few specifics about their plans for Site 5, which could involve a soaring tower and residential space that might alter the timing of the promised delivery of affordable housing units.
A developer’s move to close the famous graffiti site in 2013 didn’t kill the street-art scene. It did raise questions about the links and tensions between street art and gentrification.
East New York has long faced problems like poverty, disinvestment and crime. Now its worries concern gentrification and displacement. In a neighborhood confronting so many different risks, what role can community artists play?
The authority has held 40 meetings with residents at two developments targeted for the construction of new housing, talking out principles to guide each project. There are signs the effort is working to reduce anxieties about the new buildings.
Thinkers are dreaming up engineering solutions to ease the impact or cultural events to capitalize on it, while businesses eye ferries and bus service as potential gap-fillers. See images of some ideas.
‘The city is going behind the backs of its most engaged residents to facilitate the construction of a small number of units for people who make much more than average residents of the community.’
The system would document every commitment that gets made. One matter for debate: What exactly constitutes a commitment?
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