Public gets first look at massive Brooklyn Marine Terminal Project

From Brooklyn Eagle

Roughly 430 people attended an Aug. 12 online information session about the Brooklyn Marine Terminal Project — a $95 million plan allowing the city to consolidate its control of a 122-acre site which runs along the Columbia Waterfront District and Red Hook between Atlantic Avenue and Wolcott Street.

This was the first opportunity for the public to learn about the plan, heralded by officials as a means to transform the Brooklyn Marine Terminal into a modern maritime port and mixed-use site. The plan ties in with the city’s “Harbor of the Future” initiative.

The webinar, managed by urban design firm WXY Studio and hosted by NYC Economic Development Corp., was positioned as a first step in a public input process into the giant development. (There will be a drop-in information booth at Pier 6 in Brooklyn Bridge Park on Friday, Aug. 28 from 4-7 p.m., and a public workshop scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 28, location to be announced.)

The seminar was introduced by Brooklyn Marine Terminal Task Force Chair Rep. Dan Goldman and Vice Chair Councilmember Alexa Avilés. (Sen. Andrew Gounardes is also co-Vice Chair but was unable to attend.) Key concepts were presented by EDC’s Nate Gray and WXY’s Bahij Chancey.

The Task Force will have “ultimate approval authority” to and present a “vision document” for BMT in 2025.

Site acquired via a land swap

In May, Mayor Eric Adams, Gov. Kathy Hochul, the EDC and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey announced the city’s acquisition of the Marine Terminal site via a land swap. In return for the Brooklyn waterfront, the city is transferring its section of Howland Hook Marine Terminal on Staten Island to Port Authority, making it easier for Port Authority to expand the container port facility there.

According to Bloomberg News, the deal represents the city government’s biggest real estate transaction in terms of physical size in at least two decades.

The site is home to the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal at Pier 12; the Red Hook Container Terminal at Pier 10, along with NYC Ferry’s Atlantic Basin stop. The facility has five tenants and currently provides 500 jobs and handles 60,111 containers and 47,822 metric tons of freight per year, according to the EDC.

As part of the agreement, EDC is assuming responsibility for operations and maintenance of Piers 7-12 (Piers 9A and 9B are currently out of commission) and investing in a new container crane for operations at the terminal, among other arrangements. NYCEDC is also assuming the roughly five-year extension of Red Hook Container Terminal’s operating agreement.

According to the presentation, the project aims to:

• Support a modern maritime port that generates job opportunities and industry growth.

• Reduce emissions by shifting truck-based freight to more sustainable, water-based modes.

• Improve traffic circulation.

• Enhance neighborhood integration.

• Protect the site against increasing threats from climate change.

• Support the long-term financial sustainability of the site.

• Create new mixed-use residential development for the community, and invest in neighborhood opportunities, open space and waterfront access.

Public engagement a major concern

The webinar was intended to present an overview to introduce stakeholders to the concepts and timeline, and encourage further participation, NYCEDC and WXY presenters said. A “Public Engagement Process” chart shows future opportunities for engagement.

But some attendees expressed unease about the tightly- controlled format of this first go-round and its late-summer timing, when many residents — even Task Force co-VP Gounardes — are not available.

Seminar participants could not see or communicate with other participants, or view questions asked during the Q&A following the presentation. The Zoom’s chat function was disabled, and the Q&A section showed just questions that presenters chose to answer. Some participants who texted each other during the Q&A were surprised to find that their neighbors were experiencing the same issues.

PortSide NewYork’s Carolina Salguero told the Brooklyn Eagle that she submitted a question about why the city is using

“That landing page and flyer was created in two days to alert the community to this public meeting that they sprung on us with no outreach, no official flyer, only 10 days advance warning and at a time of year when many residents of our community are away,” Leyva said. “Our own senator, who is on the Task Force, was away and couldn’t attend the meeting.”

Leyva said that his waterfront community went in to the seminar hopeful that the city would understand the need for their engagement, but members were disappointed. “There was no engagement. It was just a bunch of nonsense and we were not allowed to participate in any way.”

The Cobble Hill Association, however, called the seminar a promising start.

“The Cobble Hill Association is grateful to the EDC for providing an update on the Brooklyn Marine Terminal waterfront redevelopment project and outlining their plan for community engagement,” the group said.

CHA added, “At this stage, it’s too early to assess whether the process will be truly open and community-driven. However, this public information session, where EDC either addressed questions directly or offered transparent explanations when answers were not available, marks a promising start. The waterfront redevelopment has the potential to be transformative not only for the neighboring communities but for all of Brooklyn. We trust that the same careful planning being applied to the community engagement process will extend to gathering and incorporating meaningful feedback into the master plan.”

See the full presentation at edc.nyc.