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Can the Brooklyn Botanic Garden and proposed high-rise housing next door coexist?
By
Arun Venugopal
Published Oct 20, 2024
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Courtesy of Katarzyna Gawin
By
Arun Venugopal
Published Oct 20, 2024
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The fate of a controversial high-rise apartment building long proposed for a site neighboring the Brooklyn Botanic Garden could come down to the precise angle of the building’s roof.
The project is a 355-unit tower with 91 to 106 affordable units slated for 962-70 Franklin Ave., just across the street from the garden. It's now before the City Council as part of a circuitous, yearslong journey through the city’s development bureaucracy.
Critics of the project argued at a Council hearing on Wednesday that the 10-story building would cast a long shadow over part of the nearby garden, imperiling some of its most precious plants and flowers. The project’s sloped roof — and whether it slopes enough — is getting a lot of attention in the debate over the planned development.
Officials said the project’s fate could ultimately depend on judgments about the roof's design. After extensive revisions, the roof now “slopes up at a 15-degree angle to minimize shadows on the hardy and native plants,” according to planning documents.
“We must ensure that unique open spaces and cultural assets like the Brooklyn Botanic Garden are not unduly harmed by shadows from development,” Councilmember Crystal Hudson, who represents the area, said at the hearing. “And while the applicant has proposed changes that would lessen the impact and duration of shadows on the garden, I still have concerns.”
A scene from Brooklyn Botanic Garden.
Courtesy of Katarzyna Gawin
The debate between advocates for the sprawling garden and the developer, Continuum, highlights tensions over housing needs and green space in a city in dire need of both. Garden President Adrian Benepe noted that the 52-acre garden is a “publicly owned asset” that holds “plants from five continents,” including many rare and endangered species.
William Wallace IV, senior acquisitions officer at Continuum, said the company had already significantly scaled back the project from the original vision, which called for two high-rises instead of one.
“We further reduced it,” he said at Wednesday's hearing. “We tried to get all of the shadows out of the way.”
Continuum did not respond to Gothamist's requests for comment.
The local community board has rejected the project. And in July, Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso officially disapproved it as well, saying the botanic garden “is sacred, and this one-of-a-kind community resource deserves one-of-a-kind consideration.” An aide to Reynoso said the borough president had no further comment.
It's a big deal if you're taking away 15% of the sunlight those plants are going to receive.
Adrian Benepe, Brooklyn Botanic Garden president
Despite that opposition, the project got the go-ahead from the City Planning Commission in September. Dan Garodnick, director of the city's planning department, said modifications to the proposal had helped create “a path forward that balances the need for new housing with critical protections for a treasured community space.”
“The Brooklyn Botanic Garden is a jewel of the borough,” Garodnick said in a statement, “and the special protections that we have proposed will ensure it can thrive far into the future while also creating the housing this community needs.”
In the City Council, the project needs committee approval before heading to the full body. Documents from the City Planning Commission show a variety of impacts from the structure, depending on the ultimate size of the project and the slope of the roof.
Benepe, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden president, said the greenery at greatest risk from the proposed building includes “orchids, tropical plants, desert plants — plants that are used to having a full day of sunlight.”
“So you can say, ‘What's the big deal if you lose an hour or 45 minutes of sunlight?’” he said. “It's a big deal if you're taking away 15% of the sunlight those plants are going to receive.”
He added that further modifications on the part of Continuum would assuage the garden's concerns.
"If they compromise just a little bit more, we'll be in a position to say, 'We can live with that,'" Benepe said
Tagged
housing
brooklyn
Brooklyn Botanic Garden
Crown Heights
environment
Race And Justice Unit
Arun Venugopal
Arun Venugopal is a senior reporter for the WNYC and Gothamist Race & Justice Unit who focuses on issues of race and bias in our region. His reporting also tackles the topics of immigration, faith, and inequality. Arun serves as the regular fill-in host of the station's "U.S. of Anxiety" program. Arun was the creator and host of Micropolis, a series about race and identity. He is a contributor to NPR's Morning Edition and All Things Considered. He has appeared on PBS Newshour, On the Media and Studio 360, and has been published in The Guardian, The Wall Street Journal and Salon. He also frequently serves as an emcee and moderator of panel discussions on race, religion, and identity issues and has been a guest host of NPR's "Fresh Air." He lives with his family in Queens.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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