What? It’s Thursday? Oh, well, then it must be time for… as my father would say, same shit, different day. Actually, we’re just late in reporting: it was Wednesday, and it was the Citizens Union this time, the “city’s oldest good-government organization” as the Times puts it. They offer a succinct position paper that addresses the major points of the opposition: that the plan should undergo a binding ULURP (right now, the stadium can proceed without city input), that the development authority be better scrutinized, that the BPC revenue not be diverted, and that we shouldn’t be racing ahead thinking we’ll get the Olympics. In other words, Dan Doctoroff’s Olympic fetish shouldn’t be driving the development bus. Given their roots opposing Tammany Hall, they are a little more lively and strident than the RPA, who we imagine are taking the tactical route (also known as the cop from the 1970’s advice vis-a-vis rape: if you know it’s going happen, you should relax and enjoy it) but end up coming off as too obsequious — even though their numbers are at best inconclusive about the need for 30 million square feet of office space over the next 30 years and the residential real estate market is at an all time high, they fall all over themselves repeating that the West Side development can’t be driven by residential development, even though that would be by far the most visionary solution. Given the limited amount of authority the city has, it’s questionable that focusing on the overall development scheme — which the city does control — would have any impact on the stadium. If you think there would be a hestitation to plunk down a new stadium on the West Side with no additional development, we recommend you pay a visit to where the Jets play currently before pondering that question any further.
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It’s Wednesday; time for some public interest group to oppose the West Side stadium.
What? It’s Thursday? Oh, well, then it must be time for… as my father would say, same shit, different day. Actually, we’re just late in reporting: it was Wednesday, and it was the Citizens Union this time, the “city’s oldest good-government organization” as the Times puts it. They offer a succinct position paper that addresses the major points of the opposition: that the plan should undergo a binding ULURP (right now, the stadium can proceed without city input), that the development authority be better scrutinized, that the BPC revenue not be diverted, and that we shouldn’t be racing ahead thinking we’ll get the Olympics. In other words, Dan Doctoroff’s Olympic fetish shouldn’t be driving the development bus. Given their roots opposing Tammany Hall, they are a little more lively and strident than the RPA, who we imagine are taking the tactical route (also known as the cop from the 1970’s advice vis-a-vis rape: if you know it’s going happen, you should relax and enjoy it) but end up coming off as too obsequious — even though their numbers are at best inconclusive about the need for 30 million square feet of office space over the next 30 years and the residential real estate market is at an all time high, they fall all over themselves repeating that the West Side development can’t be driven by residential development, even though that would be by far the most visionary solution. Given the limited amount of authority the city has, it’s questionable that focusing on the overall development scheme — which the city does control — would have any impact on the stadium. If you think there would be a hestitation to plunk down a new stadium on the West Side with no additional development, we recommend you pay a visit to where the Jets play currently before pondering that question any further.