Atlantic Yards is being built by Forest City Ratner Companies, which is headed by Bruce Ratner. The developer bought the station from the railway (to be more exact, from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority), which owns various transport systems in New York (including the metro) for $100 million, although the Metropolitan Transportation Authority itself valued the station at $214.5 million. A proposal from another company, Extell, which offered to buy the station for $150 million, was ignored. Since the railway belongs to the government, the shortfall of $114.5 may be considered an indirect subsidy to the developer. The total value of such subsidies is estimated by the New York Post to be in excess of $2 million.

The project has provoked fierce argument. The Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn website, which is the most active opposition to the project, contains a list of 53 public organizations which are against Bruce Ratner’s plans (http://dddb.net/php/opposition.php). The New York Times frequently publishes articles exposing Ratner. There is indignation at the strange conditions of the agreement between the developer and the government – conditions that are very favourable to Ratner and very unfavourable to the government – and also at certain flaws in the project from the point of view of urban planning and design. The project’s 6430 apartments can accommodate from 12,500 to 17,000 people, which will make this district the most densely populated in not just New York, but the whole world. It seems doubtful that, given such a large number of residents, a 18,000-seat stadium, and a shopping centre, there will be no traffic jams on the crossroads where the development is to be built (especially since this is the intersection of two of Brooklyn’s most important highways). Clearly, the local community – made up in the main of people of no great wealth, many of them owners of small businesses – is upset at this invasion of their district by big money, at the construction of apartments for uninvited incomers from other parts of the city, at the supermarket which will put small local shops out of business, and at the corrupt use of influence, which is offensive to Americans’ democratic ideals.