Council Member Levin Questions Scale Of 80 Flatbush

BOERUM HILL – The New York City Council zoning subcommittee heard hours of testimony from supporters and opponents of 80 Flatbush on Tuesday.

Yesterday’s hearing was the next step in the 80 Flatbush project’s Uniform Land Use Review Procedure (ULURP) process. The controversial proposal was unanimously approved by the City Planning Commission last week.

Alloy Development has requested that the project site—bounded by Flatbush Avenue, State Street, 3rd Avenue, and Schermerhorn Street—be rezoned to allow the project to rise much higher than the current zoning allows. The taller of the two proposed new towers would stand 986 feet tall.

The development firm plans to build two mixed-use towers on the site, one 38 stories and one 74 stories. 80 Flatbush would include 700 market-rate apartments and 200 permanently affordable units and feature a 15,000-square-foot cultural space, a 40,000-square-foot ground floor commercial/retail space, and two schools.

The Educational Construction Fund (ECF) originally released the RFP for the project and selected Alloy for it. ECF builds new public schools as part of mixed-use developments without using capital funding from the NYC Department of Education (DOE). The 80 Flatbush proposal includes a new 350-seat elementary school as well as an updated facility for the Khalil Gibran International Academy High School which would add 75 seats, a gymnasium, cafeteria, and library.

Opponents of 80 Flatbush argue that the project is out-of-scale for the neighborhood, would increase congestion, and would block the sun at nearby public spaces. Supporters counter saying that a new school is needed for Khalil Gibran and that the development would bring additional school seats, more office space and affordable housing units to an area with access to multiple transit options at the nearby Atlantic Terminal.

“This is a wealthy part of the city which has higher than average incomes, median home prices approaching $2 million, and average rents of $3,000 per month,” Alloy’s CEO, Jared Della Valle, said at yesterday’s hearing, according to Curbed. “The threat of displacement is low, and an opportunity exists to create more economic diversity through the provision of new affordable housing. The housing crisis affects all communities, and the efforts to address it should be shared equally across the city.”

Council Member Stephen Levin whose District 33 covers the site, weighed in saying, “I consider it a transitional block, and therefore this is something we are going to have to try and reconcile over the next couple of weeks,” Crain’s New York reported.

“Frankly, height doesn’t really matter to me that much,” Levin added, according to Patch. “It’s about the scale, it’s about the experience of the local residents, and density is the thing that impacts experience more than height.”

Brooklyn Community Board 2 voted against the project in May and Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams released his advisory recommendations on the project in June, calling for a “reduction in the bulk and height of the proposed skyscraper on 3rd Avenue,” recommending a cap of 600 feet for the taller tower.

The next step of the 80 Flatbush ULURP process is a vote by the zoning subcommittee, followed by the City Council’s Land-Use Committee vote, then the full City Council vote at the end of September.