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Ratner Planning Prefab Alternatives For Atlantic Yards
By
Garth Johnston
Published Mar 17, 2011
Modified Mar 17, 2011
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By
Garth Johnston
Published Mar 17, 2011
Modified Mar 17, 2011
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With Frank Gehry long gone, how low-brow can Forest City Ratner take the never ending Atlantic Yards project? Well, the company is seriously considering making the project's first non-stadium building, a 34-story residential tower adjacent to the Barclay Center, the world's tallest prefabricated building.
Inspired in part by the above video of a 15-story tower going up in China over two days, the Times reports that Bruce Ratner has ordered the building's latest architect, SHoP Architects, to work on both regular and modular designs for the 400-unit building.
Assuming that the structure can support itself, withstand winds, and pass other structural tests a prefab building would be a huge boon financially for Forest City Ratner, which has had much difficulty financing the project since the markets collapsed. But, as the Gray Lady points out, those savings would come at the expense of one of the projects most consistant supporters: construction unions.
Part of what makes building prefab structures so cost effective is that much of the work is done off-site in a factory (Ratner is scouting locations in Long Island City) and then bolted together on-site. And guess what, workers in a factory setting are entitled to a whole lot less money. For instance, "a carpenter earns $85 an hour in wages and benefits on-site, but only $35 an hour in a factory."
As you can imagine, the highly anti-Ratner crew at Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn are not amused by this new plan. They argue this move "seriously undermines one of the project’s prime selling points—the claimed provision of “17,000” (really 1,700 over 10 years) good-paying union construction jobs—and further imperils any potential fiscal benefits for the city and state, since many of the jobs would pay far less than what had been projected."
Candace Carponter, legal director for Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn, hammers the point home: “Jobs and affordable housing accounted for nearly all of the Atlantic Yards project’s promised benefits, and with Ratner’s selling-out of the unions, shelving of any office space, and the scarcity of subsidies for housing, the community is left with the arena as the primary “benefit” - if you believe a traffic-choking, noise-generating, taxpayer-money-losing white elephant is somehow beneficial.”
And that isn't even touching on the fact that prefab buildings are, with very rare exceptions, incredibly unattractive.
Tagged
Atlantic Yards
brooklyn
Bruce Ratner
Forest City Ratner
Garth Johnston
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