Markowitz, Bloomberg, Pataki, Ratner, Schumer (Dec 10, 2003)

I got this in an email from Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn.

Five years ago today, December 10, 2003, Forest City Ratner officially unveiled
its Atlantic Yards proposal. Bruce Ratner, joined at Brooklyn Borough Hall by
Borough President Markowitz, Senator Schumer, Mayor Bloomberg and Governor Pataki,
announced his plans to build the massive project extending east from the intersection
of Flatbush and Atlantic Avenues, in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn.

(NoLandGrab
is
wishing the billionaire’s boondoggle a Happy Birthday Atlantic Yards, unfavorably
comparing the progress of the project to that of a five-year old child who would
be toilet-trained and in pre-school by now.)

Bruce Ratner announced that his new arena for the Nets–the team he had just overpaid
to purchase–would open to the public in 2006. The project
overview released by Forest City Ratner on that December day read, on page
5: "Arena development to begin at the end of 2004, with completion
set for the summer of 2006."