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Downtown Far Rockaway Update
In the "Downtown Far Rockaway" rezoning they are building as tall as FIFTEEN (15) stories "in context with the neighborhood" where the tallest buildings are the 6 floor Redfern NYCHA projects and MOST housing in the area consists of one and two story homes (though there are SOME apartment houses on one side to town.
The EDC plans are to ADD 5,000 people to the downtown Far Rockaway area while there is a vast amount of vacant space in the Arverne urban renewal area. In an area where two cars to a family are common, these "projects" will have only 0.86 parking spaces per apartment.
The store space will be controlled by the same people, the Rita Stark estate" who forced the deterioration in the first place. And Councilman Donovan Richards and the EDC have already made plans to give the apartments to Phipps Houses, secured by a $233.3 million "loan" from the city. Don't wait for the Rockaway Development and Re
I would suggest that the Phipps organization is knowingly and deliberately working to violate federal law. They know, or ought to know, that their construction will accentuate segragation in Far Rockaway.
Their answer to any serious questions is "just wait." This from experts who didn't even bother to find out where current residents shop (the Five Towns area of Nassau County).
Wait for what? DOT says that the solution to traffic jams in the area is to narrow streets and reduce traffic lanes. They have already diverted so much traffic from Beach Channel Drive that they have had to install speed humps on Redfern and Brunswick Avenues to slow traffic returning from Five Towns shopping.
The MTA says that improving service on the "A" train to accommodate these people without cars costs too much. There have been uncounted deaths from old age while people wait for the buses (rapid transit indeed).
For more information, see http://bayswatercivic.org/whatsnew.html.