Outside Barclays Center, trucks wait, idle on Dean Street, unable to enter loading dock (despite promises of tight scheduling)

Yes, trucks are still waiting on residential Dean Street outside the Barclays Center, even though they're not supposed to. They're supposed to be tightly scheduled. That doesn't quite work, as shown in video from last night showing trucks unloading from the Justin Bieber concert.

Remember how New York Magazine critic Justin Davidson, in his 9/21/12 essay Barclays Center Is Brooklyn’s Ready-Made Monument, wrote:

For all its swagger, the arena makes nice to the neighbors in various ways... To avoid clogging roadways, trucks swing into the Dean Street loading docks and ride elevators to a massive underground turntable that positions them in their respective bays.

Or how New York Times critic Michael Kimmelman, in his 11/1/12 review, wrote:

No, this isn’t a beautiful or ingratiating building, but it’s technologically smart, with an underground turntable for trucks that may sound eye-rollingly dull but makes traffic engineers like the city’s transportation commissioner, Janette Sadik-Khan, swoon because it reduces the number of backing up and double-parked 16-wheelers on nearby streets like Dean.

It's not supposed to reduce the number of 16-wheelers, it's supposed to eliminate them--at least if they follow the rules.

On AY Watch

Well, in an incident report on Atlantic Yards Watch, Peter Krashes wrote:

Two trucks queued on Dean Street waiting for entry to the loading dock for at least half an hour. The second truck turned off its engine, but the first idled for up to half an hour. Only when NYPD asked the driver to turn off its engine did he turn it off. The first driver did confirm that he came from the Navy Yard. He wasn't happy he had to wait at the arena. The trucks finally entered the elevators when two other trucks in the loading dock emerged.

In the first video, the trucks arrive and queue.



In the second, they continue to queue; the first truck, Krashes reported, continued to idle despite a request to turn the engine off.




In the third video, the trucks in the loading dock exit and the waiting trucks finally enter the elevator. There are still Beliebers trying to get a glimpse of their idol.

Bieber fever at the Barclays Center, in photos

Some photos from yesterday's Justin Bieber event at/outside the Barclays Center. Note that the initial set of barriers were removed at the request of the police.

Before the concert, on Dean Street, waiting for Bieber; photos by AYInfoNYC

Before the concert, on Sixth Avenue, waiting for Bieber

Before the concert, on Sixth Avenue, waiting for Bieber 

After the concert, on Dean Street, 10:40 pm

After the concert, on Dean Street, about 10:40 pm; note Peter Krashes of the Dean Street Block Association
(in the checked shirt, under jacket) talking with Derek Lynch of Empire State Development

Times Sports columnist interviews arena GM, concludes "Packing Brooklyn’s Arena and Packing Away Discord "

In a column today headlined Packing Packing Brooklyn’s Arena and Packing Away Discord (but, curiously enough, originally headlined online "in-packed-opener-at-barclays-center-controversy-is-absent"), New York Times columnist William C. Rhoden visits Barclays Center General Manager David Anderson and declares all is well, albeit posing one microscopically challenging question at the end:

But will the Nets ever be good enough to pull Spike Lee away from his beloved Knicks and back to his Brooklyn roots?

There's mention of the postponement of the heavily promoted opener against the New York Knicks, but nothing about how Nets CEO Brett Yormark aggressively justified it, then reversed himself.

Vague mixed emotions

Rhoden quotes Nets coach Avery Johnson and a fervent Nets fan, plus a friend of the latter, who expressed more mixed emotions:

Silverstein’s friend Tim Stettner said he accompanied Silverstein to the game out of friendship, not fandom. Stettner has lived in Brooklyn for eight years and followed the emotional and ultimately failed protests against the arena project.

“It’s a complicated issue,” he said. “A lot of people say the Nets have not lived up to a lot of their promises. But it’s here, so I’m trying to enjoy it, but it’s definitely a moral dilemma.”

And why might that be? Rhoden is vague, and Stettner is as close as the column gets to a skeptic. It's a rather skewed set of interviewees.

Mending fences?

Rhoden writes:

While the Nets revel in the magic of a new arena and laying down fresh roots, they acknowledge the many fences that must be mended. The arena is the anchor of a larger development initiative that still irks opponents of the project. Residential properties are planned to be built behind the arena.

“There are a lot of detractors with this building,” Anderson, the general manager, said. “A lot of people pushed back on this building, so everything we do is under a microscope.”

He still sees protesters standing across the street from the arena. But all of the protests and emotion were no match for money and power. Still, as Anderson noted, Barclays Center has presented significant employment opportunities, albeit most of them part time.

“I’ve had this one guy, a pastor from a church, and I probably have 20 people who go to his church working here,” Anderson said.

And how does that compare to the promises made initially? Are the numbers used now honest? What about the people suing over promised full-time jobs and union cards?

Actually, people aren't "protesting" across the street. They're monitoring what's going on, including the periodic penetration of bass into the neighborhood and people's homes. Why not ask Anderson about that?

The GM's take

Rhoden writes about Anderson without pointing out that the original GM, John Sparks, left mysteriously, as did the arena's head of security, Bob Sena:

A native of Chicago, Anderson has extensive experience opening and operating arenas, including United Center in Chicago, Staples Center in Los Angeles and Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego. He also ran the Olympic basketball arena in Beijing.

“This is the toughest building I’ve ever opened because of the dynamics,” he said. “It means so much to a lot of people. It took eight years to get built; it’s very controversial. You really have to double- and triple-check what you’re about to do before you do it.”

And have they done that? What about the bass? Whether trucks really are using the loading dock in a timed fashion, rather than idling in the streets? What about people flooding Atlantic Avenue after events, causing either a freeze of traffic or posing hazards to themselves and vehicles?

And what about those $15 tickets? Forget neighborhood protesters; fans in general should be alerted about the hype.

Barclays Center round-up: Nets-Knicks rescheduled; $1M from NBA; the Guardian, Newsday, SBNation take on arena; is there a rivalry yet?

Well, the much-hyped first home game for the Brooklyn Nets, scheduled and reconfirmed for last night before it was belatedly canceled, has been rescheduled to Monday, Nov. 25. Yes, TNT will televise it nationally.

We're still waiting for the transportation plan to be announced before tomorrow night's opener against the Toronto Raptors, but people must be optimistic about that: prices on the secondary market have risen from $35 to $52 in a day.

And the NBA and its players maybe realized that they had a public relations problem on their hands. So they're both doing the right and, I'd say, some strategic p.r. From the Star-Ledger:

Following the lead of the NFL and its players union, the NBA and its players union, the NBPA, have jointly agreed to donate $1 million to the Red Cross and other organizations, including The Salvation Army, New York Cares and Jersey Cares, to aid those groups' efforts in helping people affected by Hurricane Sandy.

A shitshow near the arena

Will Leitch wrote in New York magazine, Tomorrow Night, the Brooklyn Nets Are Real:

If you've been around downtown Brooklyn over the last couple of days, it's been that much more clear why there was no way the Brooklyn Nets could have hosted that opener against the New York Knicks last night. We met a friend for a drink last night at Black Sheep, a bar just down the street from Barclays, at 9 p.m., and the whole front concourse of the arena was still packed with people trying to get on buses. (We sort of imagined them finally getting on one after showing up earlier that morning.) It was a shitshow already; trying to play a basketball game — an opening basketball game — would have been a nightmare. And that's not even accounting for the question of, uh, how anyone was going to get there. So: They will try it again tomorrow night.

Some arena round-ups

The Guardian's SportBlog (The Guardian!) offers Brooklyn Nets: NBA's newest franchise ends 55 years of hurt since Dodgers left: Team owned by Russian billionaire and rapper Jay-Z is set to bring major-league sport back to the most populous borough:

...when the Dodgers took off for Los Angeles, leaving behind a gaping hole in the hearts of their fans, never mind the enormous hole containing the undeveloped rail yards space which would remain virtually untouched while the borough went into a deep slide.

The functioning rail yards, which were never put out for bid, actually. The conclusion:

Yes, there are still protests about the project, about traffic and parking and more, but the Nets' public-relations battle is centered on developing a fanbase for a team that has landed smack in the middle of Knicks territory. According to one report, the team is paying $25 to store owners to put Nets posters in their windows that read "First Home Game since 1957". The subways are blanked with the new Nets colors and logos and the catchphrase "Hello Brooklyn", all designed to bring a hometown feel to the borough's new team.

Will it work? Yes – and especially if they win.

From Newsday, Brooklyn's Barclays Center: the food, the art, the shops. This article concerns only the interior of the arena--well, including some shops at the arena that are open to the street.

Reasons for protest

SBNation, Branding Brooklyn:

Those who protest the existence of the Barclays Center and the attendant development of Atlantic Avenue [sic] do so on three grounds: That the state displaced hundreds of residents via the use of eminent domain to secure Ratner's rights to the property; that the hoped-for affordable housing on Atlantic has yet to, and may never, materialize; and that the development of Atlantic will lead to runaway gentrification. The first complaint is plainly valid—eminent domain is brutal—and the second may become so, depending on what happens with those holes in the ground at the edge of Prospect Heights. The third complaint is crazy. This corner of Brooklyn gentrified a long time ago, which is why the most constant complaints about the arrival of the Barclays Center come not from long-time residents who fear rising rents, but from those residents whose arrival has caused rents to rise. (Full disclosure: I am one of those residents.)

I'd point to the Culture of Cheating.

The conclusion:

"The boys on the Knicks, maybe they're not from New York, but at least they want to come here," he said. “Just like people from all over the world want to come here. That makes it a hometown team. But the Nets? The Brooklyn Nets? The Brooklyn Nets is just a logo. Maybe one day it'll be more than that, but not yet. Not for a long time."

Is there a rivalry?

New York Times columnist Harvey Araton, Proximity Alone Does Not a Rivalry Make:

“No disrespect to them, it’s not a rivalry, not yet,” [Knicks center Tyson Chandler] said, before turning his attention to the Knicks’ opener at Madison Square Garden on Friday night against the Miami Heat, an opponent worthy of some good old-fashioned hatred, and at least as much envy.
Chandler was not being intentionally banal, merely contending that you do not declare a rivalry as much as you create one. “Two teams have to go through some big things,” he said, suggesting, for starters, a hot playoff series or two.
...The shortsighted benefit of Thursday night’s sensible postponement in the wake of Hurricane Sandy and far more pressing concerns is that the Nets were spared the embarrassment of hearing those familiar Knicks cheers in their sparkling new home after enduring them in three New Jersey arenas over three and a half decades.
Anecdotal evidence of turncoat Knicks fans aside, we will know with far greater certainty that the Nets have arrived as a true intracity alternative when a fair number of their Nets loyalists manage to storm the Garden and create a similar mixed crowd dynamic.

Well, maybe. There are a lot more Knicks season-ticket holders to make it tougher to "storm the Garden."

Nets game tomorrow without full subway service, but arena CEO promises some transportation news; expect NYPD to again prioritize traffic flow over ticketing scofflaws, despite promises of enforcement

In spite of the worst damage in the history of the New York City subway system after the storm Sandy, the Brooklyn Nets "historic" home opener tomorrow night against the New York Knicks will go on as planned, likely because the temptation--for the NBA, team, and arena brass--of a nationally televised debut was just too great.

Ticketholders will be challenged to drive, carpool, take the LIRR, ride buses, and perhaps use limited subway service to reach the arena, which was sited to rely on subway service. Nets CEO Brett Yormark tweeted that a plan would be announced today on the Barclays Center web site, though there's nothing yet.

Many Nets fans cheered, though one understandably groused that the Nets "don't care about the NJ fans." One commenter on Twitter called it "NBA hubris at its worst." WFAN's Craig Carton said,  according to CBS, "First off, half of us don’t have power, not gonna be able to watch the game anyway on TNT, number one. Number two, it’s offensive. It’s offensive to everybody that doesn’t have power, that’s displaced from their homes or far worse.”

Official push

But it seems clear that those behind the transit system, surely with a push from Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Mike Bloomberg, will do what they can to make things work, even if the expenditure of resources detracts from more pressing needs. (Perhaps a few subway lines will be open, at least as shuttles within Manhattan and Brooklyn, and there may be some express or charter buses. But the subway system could be out four to five days, Bloomberg said yesterday.)

Does anyone believe that the New York Police Department, which answers to Bloomberg (a backer of the team and the new Barclays Center, and who said he's going to the game), won't do its best to ensure traffic runs smoothly, even if that means residents in the blocks surrounding the arena will continue to face idling livery cabs and illegal parking?

Expect a lot of business at the official arena lot, and other lots associated with the arena, via ClickAndPark, as well as others services, such as ParkWhiz. In fact, anyone with a lot will likely be promoting it--maybe even people with driveways to rent out.

Atlantic Avenue, Wed. 8:41 am

And expect some heavy traffic by 6 pm Thursday. The arena itself was mainly unscathed. But the fear will be gridlock like that at about 8:40 am today, in the photo at left of traffic on Atlantic Avenue near Downtown Brooklyn, via Aaron Naparstek.

Markowitz support 

Even before the decision was made yesterday, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz was on board.

"Right now, our biggest priority in Brooklyn is helping with the recovery from this terrible storm," Markowitz told ESPNNewYork.com. "I am confident that the NBA, in conjunction with the MTA, the NYPD and all of the necessary city agencies, will make a decision that represents the best interests not only of sports fans but of all of our citizens in New York City."

"If the game is played Thursday, I certainly encourage fans to carpool and to take city buses -- which will begin running with limited service at 5 p.m. today," Markowitz continued. "I expect that adequate numbers of traffic agents will be employed to move traffic swiftly, as has been the experience with the previous events at the Barclays Center."

How can anything Markowitz says be taken seriously, after he's proven his willingness to shill for arena developer Forest City Ratner? And how can there be "adequate numbers of traffic agents" when the situation--likely without 10,000-plus people taking the subway--is different?

Media coverage

The Times (which didn't get the news into its print edition, right, for which the page closed at 7 pm) reported:

Rescheduling the Knicks-Nets game would have been challenging, given national television and arena commitments. On the plus side, the league would not have had to factor in travel schedules.
Any delay would have been a blow to the Nets — who are set to host the first major sporting event in Brooklyn since the Dodgers left in 1957 — and to their fans.

Not all the fans, I'd bet. It was a business decision.

In the New York Post, Brooklyn-born Knicks star Carmelo Anthony stated, “I hope they don’t [postpone it]. That would be a monumental game for Brooklyn as an organization, as a borough."

USA Today reported:

The decision was made to play because players and referees will be in the New York region, and the NBA consulted with New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's office and the Nets, a person familiar with the situation told USA TODAY Sports.

That doesn't sound like a full accounting of the interests at play. Will Leitch of New York magazine enthused:

This might turn into one of those "can't keep New York down!" nights, and hey: The game's cheaper to go to now too.

From the New York Daily News

A predictable shill

But USA Today found a predictable shill:

A choked public transit system, streets blocked by debris and scattered power outages are doing little to shake public confidence in a timely recovery.
"It's New York," says Eddy St. Louis, co-owner of Machavelle Sports Bar and Lounge, nestled across the street from the new arena. "The trains will be back on schedule, the buses will be running. Everything will fall back into place. We prepare for stuff like this."

No, the trains won't be all back on schedule, though the buses will be running. If they're going to interview someone whose business depends on the arena, why not talk with residents down the block?

A Yormark defender

Note the debate on Twitter between Daily News beat reporter Stefan Bondy, who often seems in sync with Nets/arena CEO Brett Yormark (Bondy tweeted, in Yormarkian style, "Sandy can't keep Brooklyn down"), and Brooklyn activist Daniel Goldstein.

Bondy cited a post-9/11 Yankee game as part of bringing people together; Goldstein suggested this was about TV revenues. Bondy suggested it's "right decision for more than money," and Goldstein responded that it "seems tone deaf." I'd add that the effects of 9/11, though enormously traumatic, were concentrated in one section of the city, and did not cripple the transportation system.

What will the cops do?

At the 10/16/12 first meeting of the Atlantic Yards Quality of Life Commitee, neighbors near the Barclays Center cited rampant illegal parking by livery cabs and limos, as well as idling illegally and in driving lanes. 

They were told that the solution was less enforcement than finding a place for those vehicles to queue. But that wasn't what they were told two months earlier, as described below.

“We know there's a big issue with black cars and limos,” said Arana Hankin, Director, Atlantic Yards Project, Empire State Development who added that the agency was “working closely with Forest City [Ranter], NYPD, city DOT to find an area where black cars can queue legally... We’re in the process right now of finalizing that location.” (It hasn't been announced.)

Captain Michael Ameri of the 78th Precinct said the Taxi and Limousine Commission had, at the second Barbra Streisand concert, “confiscated 27 illegal livery cabs.” The second solution, he said, is to find a location for such cars.

Promises of enforcement

However, Gib Veconi of the Prospect Heights Neighborhood Development Council observed, people were talking “if black cars were invented for the opening of the Barclays Center--they weren’t."

"The answer, to all of this, was: enforcement: the NYPD was simply not going to allow these cars to park and queue and idle,” Veconi continued. “It’s great to hear we're working on a location for these cars now that the arena has opened, after the eight years of study.. but at some point, we’ve got to get enforcement."

“Enforcement is part of the answer, but it's not the solution,” Ameri responded. “The solution is to give them a place... There’s no reason to expend resources on issuing summonses when the long-term solution is to find a place for them to queue."

The issue will come up tomorrow night, surely. And it will be discussed at the next meeting of the 78th Precinct Community Council, which was supposed to be held Oct. 30 but has been rescheduled to Nov. 13 at 7:30 pm, at the station house, at 6th Avenue and Bergen Street.

The promise of enforcement

This past August, ESD issued a RESPONSE TO PUBLIC COMMENTS regarding the proposed Traffic Demand Management Plan. The document referred repeatedly to enforcement:

34. Frustrated drivers, finding the search for free on‐street parking fruitless, will be inclined to park illegally: in curb cuts, at hydrants, in sidewalks, in no‐standing zones, or anywhere parking is not allowed but the curb is accessible. We do not doubt the NYPD and other forces will ticket, boot, or tow these drivers. But the fact that such lawlessness will occur in the first place, and that such enforcement will be needed, is a direct consequence of arena patrons driving to the Barclays Center.
The TDM Plan is intended to reduce the number of vehicles driving to the arena and will encourage off‐street parking to the extent feasible for those who do choose to drive, thereby minimizing the number of drivers seeking on‐street parking. As the comment states, parking regulation enforcement will be handled by NYPD.
41. Will no honking signs be installed and enforced?
As part of an effort to reduce excessive and ineffective signage on our streets, DOT no longer will be installing No Honking Signs. DOT has found that signage does not act as an effective deterrent to excessive honking, which can be enforced in any part of the city.
64. Who will monitor double‐parking in front of the Atlantic mall? Patrons currently use Atlantic Avenue across from the arena for drop‐off and pick up.
NYPD is responsible for enforcing parking regulations.
65. Who will monitor traffic violations and how?
NYPD is responsible for enforcing parking regulations and traffic laws.

Nets-Knicks home opener will be held Thursday; decision made before anyone knows if subway system will be working

The NBA has announced that, yes, the regular-season home opener for the Brooklyn Nets, a nationally-televised (TNT) game against the New York Knicks, will go on as scheduled at 7:00 pm on Thursday.

That's a rather aggressive decision, given that we don't know how much mass transit will be up and running by then, given that Mayor Mike Bloomberg said today that it could take three to five days before the subway system is back, after the devastation of the storm known as Sandy.

(Then again, you can bet arena developer Bruce Ratner has been in contact with the governor and mayor, urging them to make sure that lines serving the arena are functional.)

Whose interests rule?

It suggests that the interests of the league, the network, and the arena operators trump those of the ticket holders and the citizens of Brooklyn. USA Today reported:

The decision was made to play because players and referees will be in the New York region, and the NBA consulted with New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's office and the Nets, a person familiar with the situation told USA TODAY Sports.

After all, a good number of ticket holders may--if things don't improve--have a very tough time getting to the arena. And if many more people drive, or even take the bus, then the likelihood grows of untoward impacts on the neighborhoods around the arena.

Daily News beat reporter channels Yormark

That's not to say they can't pull it off, with some luck.

But to decide on holding the game before anyone knows if mass transit will work--when the arena was built to rely on mass transit--is a stone cold power move, as well as something of a bet. Apparently, the money, the publicity, the inevitable Brooklyn Dodgers tie-in are all too inevitable to be stopped.

"Going to be a huge night," arena/team CEO Brett Yormark predicted on Twitter.

You can say that again. People are already asking him how to get to the arena.

After storm, city/region/MTA face recovery; delay in subway reopening places cloud over Nets' planned home opener Nov. 1; Albert, Prokhorov offer optimism about Nets (updated)

There's been no word yet about the impact of the huge storm Sandy on the Barclays Center, other than the predictable (and early yesterday) announcement that tonight's Journey concert would be canceled.

On Dean St. side of the arena; photos by Raul Rothblatt

However, given that the subway system "has never faced a disaster as devastating as what we experienced last night," according to Chairman Joseph Lhota, and the city faces enormous challenges after power outages and flooding, as reported by the New York Times, it will take days, perhaps more, for the city and region to recover.

So I'm not going out on a limb to predict that tomorrow's Smashing Pumpkins concert at the arena will be canceled. (Update: it was postponed.) Last night, the first in a week of Jimmy Kimmel shows at the Brooklyn Academy of Music--a series keyed to the Brooklyn Nets season--was canceled. It's not clear whether tonight's show will go on.

The Nets opener

What about the much-anticipated Brooklyn Nets home opener Thursday, Nov. 1, against the New York Knicks? The Times's Howard Beck confirms "no definitive word" from the NBA.

Another view of Dean Street

But the prospect seems less likely, given statements this morning that it could take "four or five" or "three or four" days to get the subways up and running.

It still remains possible that, if subways are functioning by Thursday afternoon, the game could go on.

If it does go through as planned, even if billed as a salute to the resiliency of the city and of Brooklyn, the excitement surely will be muted, given that New Yorkers have been forced to recognize that sports fandom, and entertainment, however a part of the fabric of life, run well behind survival of the city and its systems.

The Atlantic Avenue side

That would also put a damper on plans to bring back some Brooklyn Dodgers for a ceremony to install the flag from Ebbets Field (and a plaque) on the arena plaza.

There were reports on Twitter that some construction materials on the Dean Street side of the arena were flying away in the wind.

As seen in the photos, part of the construction fence was lost.

Also, one small tree outside the arena was downed (left), and some metal fencing at the parking lot was overturned (below right).

Run-up promotion

Meanwhile, in the run-up to the anticipated home opener, the New York Times offers a bit of synergy, an essay by new Nets play-by-play announcer Marv Albert, Back Home in Brooklyn, Marv Albert Welcomes a New Resident:

On Pacific Street east of Carlton 

The Nets have come to Brooklyn, where I grew up. And even after nearly 50 years of calling basketball games, I can’t wait.

But when I call their first regular-season game at Barclays Center, on Thursday night against the Knicks, I will not be curious about whether the move from New Jersey will go well. It will. I will want to know if a hard-core Nets crowd will be at the arena. One of my measuring sticks for the success of the Brooklyn Nets will be their ability to overwhelm the sound and ppresence of Knicks fans.
Around the city, people keep asking me about the Nets — at a rate that I never thought possible. Fanatics from New Jersey used to be the only people who wanted to chat me up about the Nets. Sometimes, you hardly knew they had taken the court at Izod Center. Far more often, people wanted to talk to me about the Knicks — and kept asking after I left the Knicks’ TV booth to call Nets games.
The Nets are a likable group, and even without playing a game they’ve become popular. I think they’ll win over kids who haven’t developed loyalties yet.

He closes with a reference to one of Brett Yormark's favorite terms, "relevance":

Back then, of course, there was no pro alternative in New York to rooting for the Knicks. Now, the Nets can challenge them as they never did from Long Island, Piscataway, the swamps of New Jersey or Newark. They are finally relevant, and it should be fun to watch.

The New York Post offers Serby's special P&A with Mikhail Prokhorov, in which the Nets' owner tells Steve Serby (conversation or written back-and-forth?) that he expects the Nets to win an NBA championship in June (highly unlikely) and offers numerous ripostes:

Q: Why did you want to own an NBA team so badly?
A: I have a lot of experience with basketball, having owned CSKA in Russia. We made it to the Euroleague semifinals every year during the time I was there, and won the championship twice. Plus, this was just a wonderful opportunity — a down-and-out franchise about to make a historic move to Brooklyn, a new arena, a chance to really build something and make my mark. I wasn’t interested in buying any team at any price. I really wanted a big market, and when this opportunity came along with a great partner in Bruce Ratner it was obviously the right thing to do.

I suspect that making a big profit and buffing his reputation might also have been part of the equation.

The 78th Precinct Community Council

The next meeting of the 78th Precinct Community Council was supposed to be held tonight but has been rescheduled to Nov. 13 at 7:30 pm, at the station house, at 6th Avenue and Bergen Street.

It will give neighbors an opportunity to discuss arena impacts--at least those that the police can deal with, such as traffic and parking. (The cops can't do much about arena noise, but I bet they felt the bass from Sensation in their building, too.)

Times Magazine essayist: "the Barclays Center is a shrine to Brooklynland" and the Nets "are the perfect team for Brooklynland" (but what about the sponsorships?)

Jon Kelly, an editor at the New York Times Magazine, has an essay in this Sunday's issue, The Nets and Brooklyn Deserve Each Other, that takes a swipe at the Nets, essentially endorses the arena as an "unexpected gift" (without analyzing gifts to developer Bruce Ratner), and suggests both partake of/invoke a utopia he terms "Brooklynland."

He writes:

Though it has been under construction since 2010, the Barclays Center is still seen by many in Brooklyn as a Trojan Horse, a kind of unexpected gift that they’re vaguely afraid of. Outside the arena, the crowd was oddly silent. Passers-by pointed and talked in semi-spooked inside voices. The arena’s main entrance felt like La Guardia on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. There was dread, there was foreboding, there were metal detectors but there was also the whiff of excitement people get when they’re about to escape from their everyday lives. For on one side of those metal detectors was Brooklyn — a borough of tree-lined streets and quaint coffee shops, sure, but also big-box stores, empty lots and the Gowanus Canal. (On average, Brooklyn residents are roughly half as wealthy as Staten Islanders.)
On the other side of the metal detectors was the Barclays Center, but also something bigger: the promise of Brooklynland, that utopia of renovated brownstones, craft beer, rich people, farm-to-table restaurants, pencil mustaches, Wesleyan sweatshirts and now, its very own basketball team. In Brooklynland, the Crown Heights riots never happened, and people grow up to become Lena Dunham. In Brooklynland, everything seems new, but sprinkled with a bit of that old-timey stuff — like reclaimed wood, fedoras, the Dodgers — that makes it feel authentic.
The Barclays Center is uniquely connected to this vision of Brooklyn. It’s a brick-and-mortar tribute to a miraculous rebranding campaign of both a borough and a largely mediocre basketball franchise. More than that, though, the Barclays Center is a shrine to Brooklynland.

I think Kelly missed a couple of angles: "Brooklynland" also includes Jay-Z's Brooklyn, sanitized perhaps for in-building consumption, but certainly a different angle than Dunham.

And the Barclays Center is also uniquely, inextricably connected to all the brands that have bought sponsorships.

Embracing the Nets?

The Manhattan-born Kelly, who moved to Brooklyn, several years ago, began to think about becoming a Nets fan:

For decades, I accused the Nets of just being a knockoff version of the Knicks. (We got the good Bernard King, Mark Jackson and Pat Riley; they got the old Bernard King, Mookie Blaylock and John Calipari.) But never before has it been so evident. The Knicks, who also failed to land LeBron, created their own blueprint for building a team around a contingency plan of expensive second-tier superstars (Carmelo Anthony and Amare Stoudemire), a couple of overpriced decent players and cheap veterans...
The crucial difference is that while the Knicks might be unpredictable and occasionally detestable, they are at least authentically so. The Nets, in all their carpetbagger glory, are the exact opposite. They are a team of pricey stars and Kardashian exes that hasn’t had a winning season since 2006, trying to fool fans, with big salaries and cool new uniforms, into thinking they’re getting a different product than the one that bombed in Jersey.

I think that the distinction between authentic and inauthentic unpredictability/detestability is a pretty minor one on which to hang an argument. (It's about as petty as Jay-Z complaining about how people always want to "diminish your accomplishments," while actually reports of his slim stake in the Nets/arena lauded him for having outsize influence.)

The Nets and Brooklyn

Kelly comes to a conclusion:

the Nets are less a team than they are an idea of a team. In this sense, they are the perfect team for Brooklynland.
Two weeks after the Globetrotters game, I headed back to the Barclays Center for a preseason matchup between the Nets and the Washington Wizards. It was the Nets’ first game of any kind in the arena, and the fans’ excitement outside was obvious. No one seemed to be staring at the stadium as if it were out of place any longer; they just rushed in. 

Um, that's because they stopped using metal detectors.

And they're selling the borough:

During halftime at the Wizards game, I wandered into the concourse and started mulling where the Nets would be at the end of Mikhail Prokhorov’s five-year plan. They might make a deep run into the playoffs, or egos might combust in spectacular fashion. In the end, though, it wouldn’t matter. All that mattered was that, like Ikea and Fairway before them, they were here. Amid this swarm of team iconography, it was clear that the Nets had erased their past and hitched themselves to Brooklyn’s manifest destiny. The borough may have been rooting for the Nets that night, but it was really cheering for itself. And the Nets, a vagabond team with an unspectacular history, deserved that applause. I just couldn’t be a part of it.

The question is: for how long can Brooklyn be sold to itself?

Why will Islanders move to Brooklyn? Revenue from luxury suites and premium seats (& TV)

At a press conference two days ago regarding the New York Islanders's planned move in 2015 (or sooner) to Brooklyn, team owner Charles Wang stated that "our goal from the outset was to have the Islanders play in a local, world-class facility that possessed the amenities that our fans deserve. And I'm happy to announce that we've achieved that goal with today's announcement."



Translation: we need to make money from well-heeled fans (and, unmentioned, TV revenues, as Forbes's Tom Van Riper has noted).

It's the same reason the Nets moved from New Jersey. And it again raises questions about why public agencies didn't try to negotiate a better deal, especially when Forest City Ratner got concessions in 2009, while offering nothing in return.

$35 million more

The New York Times's Jeff Z. Klein last night explained one major reason why the Islanders would move from Nassau County to Brooklyn, even though they'd still be tenants: new revenues from those fans.

He wrote:

A. The short answer: $35 million in extra revenue per year. That goes a long way toward wiping out the club’s current operating deficit, estimated at $8 million per year.
The main benefit in this move “is not in the increased revenue the Isles will get from the average fan; it’s in the huge increase they’ll get from selling luxury suites and premium club seats,” said Tony Knopp, chief executive officer of Spotlight TMS, a company that manages corporate tickets at Barclays Center and other sites around the country.
The Coliseum, built in 1972 and barely renovated since, has 31 luxury suites and a relatively small number of high-priced premium seats. Knopp estimates that the suites generate about $3 million a year and the premium seats about $16 million.
Barclays Center, which is far more geographically convenient to corporate customers than the Coliseum, has 104 luxury suites. Knopp estimated that those suites would generate about $21 million for the Islanders, while premium seating would generate an additional $33 million. That comes to $54 million from suites and premium seats — $35 million more per year than what the Islanders generate at the Coliseum.