Coney Island Development

I found myself at yet another public hearing about the fate of Coney Island, this one in front of the Land Use Committee at City Hall. The situation is  very confusing now, its clear that EVERYONE wants something to change but almost nobody has the courage to slow down the process enough to change the bad plan.

Yesterday we heard alot about eminent domain and the threat of eminent domain to landowners at CI, in particular the creep Joe Sitt but also the family who own  Dino's Wonder Wheel, widely aknowledged to be serious rock steady dudes ( a highlight of the day was brother number one saying my family's been doing this for more than 25 years, our parents did it, me and my brother do it, and our seven sons will do it in the future) .. 

I was reminded of how central property ownership is not just to the idea of this country but to our laws and legislation  and I was as always dismayed by that fixation. I wish that our council members would talk about the potential for ownership as much as the protection of existent ownership and I wonder if anyone else noticed that every single one of the property owners was a white men.

As a direct result of the possible use of eminent domain several Council members - including mayoral hopeful Tony Avella, Simcha Felder and Helen Sears - suggested they would vote against the plan and even Domenic Recchia- who surprised us all by attaching a giant Dunkin Donuts cup to his left hand  instead of his usual Starbucks and who has been a champion of development at CI of said without substantial changes he would be "recommending to turn this down". I was simply amazed at the ammount of love Recchia was getting yesterday.

Joe Sitt's representative kept saying he would like it if the city would sit down with him and work out a whole new zoning, with a "real mixture of uses" -- euphemism for retail  and condos.

Anyway passions run hot on the Coney Island issue, my  other favorite part was the panel of amusement experts from all over the country , who kept saying things like
"if it wasn't for Coney my whole industry wouldn't even exist"  there isn't much that has so central a role, cinderblocks?  horses? - they also made excellent points about the co esixtence of amusement and retail and how that hybrid has never ever succeeded!

I remain a steadfast opponent of the plan, I think its just too big a plan and doesn't create good enough jobs after the contruction  is done to warrant all the expense...most of all I think its a plan based on a retail economy that is almost dead..