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NYP: DeBlasio Plows Ahead with Sunnyside Yards Plan

Feb. 21, 2015 NY Post

Mayor Bill de Blasio is moving ahead with the plan to develop the Sunnyside rail yards, according to the New York Post.

On Friday — 17 days after Gov. Andrew Cuomo said the yards were off-limits — the city’s Economic Development Corporation issued a public notice seeking a yearlong feasibility study of the nearly 200-acre site.

De Blasio proposed building 11,250 units of affordable apartments over the rail yards as a major initiative in his State of the City speech — only to be shot down within hours by Cuomo, who insisted the MTA needs the property for other uses.

“It is not available for any other use in the near term,” Cuomo said in a statement immediately after de Blasio’s State of the City Speech.

But the mayor on Friday said it’s full speed ahead.

“This is a tremendous opportunity to deliver on our vision of a more affordable city and smart development that responds to the needs of surrounding neighborhoods,” he said, calling the pending study only a “first step.”

City Hall officials said the study will focus on the 113 acres owned by Amtrak — which is cooperating with the city — and another 44 acres where the land is owned by the MTA but the air rights belong to the city

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55 Comments

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Ugh

How much longer do we have to deal w this debozio ass? Why not ruin your own borough bozo? Way to steamroll your own boss. In my line of work, that is grounds for termination. #impeach

At least Bloomberg rode the subway, clearly this guy doesn’t if he thinks the MTA can sustain this

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E loco

what are they a dictatorship? you should laugh at yourself. I guess Syria, Iraq, Egypt and Saudi Arabia are better examples of fine governments that you approve of. Or what about Libya, Bshrain, Algeria and Tunisia. All great middle eastern democracies. Keep up the laughs.

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rikki

The ONLY reason DeBozio got elected is you just had to have a minority in office….ok he did have kids by a black woman…are you happy?

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average white queens guy

who needs affordable??!! I love NYC just the way it is, UNAFFORDABLE! Who the hell does he think he is?!!

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bks37

Thanks for the link. Tremendous cost for these types of industrial waste clean ups. Even is the decking plan turns out to be feasible, the cost of the clean up will be prohibitive for developers unless either the ” affordable” housing component is cut to a bare minimum or, the government spends our tax dollars.

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Johnny

Warren Wilhelm has no regard for our community, He is the biggest phony of all time, dropped his fathers name for Political gain, a complete fraud, he talks about working class people yet he is putting 300 families out of work by closing the Horse and Carriage business because his friend Steve Nislick wants the stables property, as i live long Democrat i am disgusted how these progressive’s have hijacked this party and have zero regard for people or the rule of law in this City, he talks about the 1% yet he is the 1%.

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Don't they listen

Didn’t we send out petitions to stop this?? The residents don’t want it. It’s crowded enough & It will only DESTROY Sunnyside & Woodside. It’s bad enough developers are putting condos up & driving up high rents with the Manhattan/Brooklyn yuppies. We are the communities that have to deal with the reprocussions not the mayor..He’s outta here soon enough… We live here, some for generations.. This is Our Town, or is greed going to really just destroy this city.

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bks37

I wonder what DeBlasio’s angle is other than flat out cash payoffs. Cuomo has already shot him down in the most humiliating way possible. As it is increasingly obvious that the mayor will have only one term, he will not be around to reap any benefit if this project ever gets off the ground. These feasibility studies, by “experts”, always have a predetermined outcome that favors the viewpoint of the party that commissions it. Waste of taxpayers money. I wonder if the city council can kill this before they waste too much time and money on this boondoggle.

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What is Van Bramer doing in Israel

What is Van Bramer doing in Israel anyway.
Is he helping New York, no? Is he working for the people of Sunnyside? No.
All he is doing is endorsing a nation where its prime minister is trying to humiliate our president and country.
All our nation has ever asked of Israel is one thing: Don’t build settlements. Yet this is ignored– despite billions of dollars,Then their prime minister mocks our president like no other nation has ever done so and tries to humiliate him in congress.
Van Bramer endorses that while the Sunnyside Yards burn.
I hope he wins points with the Jewish New Yorkers. However, many Jewish New Yorkers are sick of the current Israel government.
Thanks Jimmy. Your a real hero.

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El loco

Another anti-Semitic bigot. I’m sure this bigot will never criticize any other nation but waits to criticize the only democratic nation in the Middle East. Of course we all know tha tIsrael is the only nation that ever does anything wrong. People like you are only happy when Jews shut up. i’m sure your self hating Jewish friends love you.

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Kramden's Delicious Marshall

Good question. Last time I checked, Israel is pretty far outside his district. But I suppose mentioning that fact makes me anti-semitic too.

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Sunnysider

how about mentioning it when they go other places and getting a little dig in that the country is ungrateful.

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OldenDays

wow, lots of animosity here. all he did was comment on a country’s foreign policy. what he said is true, much of the NYC jewish population disagrees with israel’s foreign and domestic policy. let’s see how many dislikes i get just for saying that.

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OldenDays

so i guess you’re just one of these “internet trolls”, trying to piss people off for no reason, and liking your own comments. i never thought our nice little community newspaper would have a troll in its comment section. except for sunnysideposthatesme, but i like that guy…at least he has something to say.

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El loco

That is false. The reason I am reacting is because he is singling out Israel for criticism. Real brave to criticize the Jews. Always a popular thing to do.

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OldenDays

honestly, i don’t agree with the tone of his post, but i still don’t think he was singling out israel for any anti-semitic reasons. he was just talking about israel because JVB happened to be there right now instead of dealing with issues in his own backyard. the “settlers” are controversial everywhere, including within israel. he probably would have a lot of bad things to say about egypt, turkey, syria, wherever, if JVB happened to be there on a junket right now (at least i hope so). maybe i’m naive i dunno

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Givemeliberty

You mean Libs and JINOS (Jews in Name only). Which are you, “Olden Days”? I love how the anti-Semites crawl out of the woodwork.

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Ugh

It’s not anti semetic to say that jvb has no jurisdiction in Israel and should be here, in the snow, with all of us and fighting for what is right for queens, not the politicians who pad his (and our stupid mayors) pockets.

And if you think my comment is anti semetic, I guess I hate myself too

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JOReilly

Is it a harbinger of the political maneuvering to come that this action is taken while Councilmember Van Bramer is in the Middle East on a visit with other members of the City Council and using social media to post about a visit to the Dead Sea? Did the Mayor intentionally take this “first step” while Mr. Van Bramer was not in town to immediately comment?

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Dana

I haven’t seen the rail cars in the picture above since the 1950s. Where did the aquarium building go?

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Patricia Dorfman

you said it, @mitch!
—–
more news soon, (as all news seems to be issuing only from mayor) thank goodness, from a coalition of some weightier types than me…more info: email [email protected]
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this appears to be a real-estate-cronies-driven “eminent domain” used against the consent of the governed…does anyone believe this has to do with affordable housing, a minor element of this mega project will cost billions not millions and permanently wreck our lives with cross streets which bring hundreds of thousands of people and traffic? this is about paving over queens for the monied people.
—–
all small businesses will be prices out in the squeeze of the glass towers of QB and the town the mayor already said will have its own stores. the small businesses around every single mega project like this in NYC are soon gone. if buildings are razed, there are also ways to circumvent rent stabilization and control.
—–

@ben: the mayor announced his plans as the centerpiece of his state of the city address before a single local hearing.

—–

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/124/232/303/please-do-not-build-over-the-sunnyside-yards/

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FreeTheBushwickInlet

Sunnyside will, of course, look to see what happened to their neighbors in Greenpoint/Williamsburg when the City promised affordable housing and parks in return for massive development. That was the 2005 Waterfront Rezoning Agreement and, ten years later, with towers built and planned for every lot along the waterfront, only a fraction of the City’s side of the agreement has been delivered.

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Julie M. Finch

Watch out and be very alert if the Cty’s Economic Development Corporation (EDC) get’s involved. They make secret deals with big developers, and then we in the neighborhoods, with our Cpmmunity Boards, our Councilmembers, and etc. have to dig through records, look up EAS & EIS statements, and pack public hearings; all to have some say. Look at Save Our Seaport and Friends of South Street Seaport .com FOSSS for examples. And affordable is relative to the neighborhood, it is NOT LOW INCOME. and not that affordable either, And the developers will claim they need to build towers for luxury apartments to make a profit.

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Sunnyside up

This guy was only elected with 24% of the vote barely over 1 million people,if all of the people affected by this vote against him we can make him a one term and done mayor

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Kramden's Delicious Marshall

For all you dopes who thought De Blasio was a champion of the “little guy” – hopefully, now you’re learning he’s just another politician in the back pocket of the wealthy real estate developers and other corporate interests.

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Jonathan

Well for one, nearly every local business will thrive. Not to mention the opportunity for new commerce. These changes being millions of dollars into the neighborhood, as well as public development (parks, playgrounds, etc.)

This is good for the neighborhood, not good for those who think Sunnyside is their small town neighborhood. Great for middle class needing affordable housing.

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Ben

I hate to just take the city’s side in this — God knows what kind of shenanigans are likely to play out over the course of any possible redevelopment of the site.

But who says the “community has no say” in this? All they’ve done so far is ask for bids for a *year long* feasibility study. Surely there will be many, many, many public hearings before anything’s decided here. Let’s maybe keep the pitchforks under wraps for the time being?

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Anonymous visitor

One-term mayor. Where’s JVB? We need to tell De Blasio to not further his goals on the back of Queens residents

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Hello

How come this community has no say in what is going on in our neighborhood? We live here, we are raising are our families here, etc. We should have a say in what is being built in our backyard. Sunnyside will not benefit from affordable housing. It started to lose that “small town in a big city” feel awhile ago, but now it will completely be gone.

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GV

Right, because a rail yard that is unusable for anything else is a totally great use of space right now. You don’t care about providing more affordable housing space for the working class in your community?

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Hello

No. I don’t care about providing affordable housing for those in my community because I guarantee it won’t be people from this community moving in to those buildings!

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Anonymous visitor

1) Affordable Housing is a scam. 1-2% of the population benefits on the cost of 99%. It will solve the problem for 200,000 in all of NYC but not for the other 8-10 million.
2) This project will kill liveability in Western Queens in all areas. It would be a pain in the neck for Sunnyside for 10+ years just with construction.

All this for a populistic mayor….No thanks.

P.S.: Park space promised – see Bushwick Inlet Park….

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rikki

There is NO such thing as affordable housing………unless its a 1 bedroom for under $1000 and is available to anyone not just a select minority through a lottery….

Why cant we build plain linoleum floor small apartments? Things are far different than even 10 years ago….I had a whole bedroom dedicated to a music room and my DJ equipment….now who has 2000 record or cds to find room for? Flat screen tvs no more tube TV so people can live in far less space and luxury

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