The Crown Heights community has spoken regarding a long-planned rezoning of an industrial stretch of Atlantic Avenue.
Photo by Susan de Vries
A report released last week by Crown Heights Council Member Crystal Hudson and the Department of City Planning details how locals want to see development play out around an industrial corridor of Atlantic Avenue largely in Crown Heights. If adopted, it would lead to a dramatic transformation of the area with new mixed-used but largely residential high-rise developments.
The Atlantic Avenue Mixed-Use Plan Community Vision and Priorities 2023 report springboards off the more than decade-old Community Board 8-led M-CROWN rezoning plan, which sought to protect manufacturing and jobs in the largely industrial area between Vanderbilt and Nostrand avenues and Bergen Street while allowing for some residential development.
The area is currently zoned M1-1, which only allows low-density industrial and commercial buildings with a lot of parking. The zoning reflects the area’s past as a major railway and trucking route.
The report is the culmination of a number of public meetings that took place earlier this year where six main main priorities were identified that will be used to inform a rezoning application.
The priorities are to:
- Increase housing density in the area with a focus on deeply affordable units, while finding ways to protect existing affordable housing.
- Create jobs for existing and new residents in the developments built.
- Redesign the heavily trafficked Atlantic Avenue corridor and increase its safety and environmental sustainability.
- Invest in job training and prioritize opportunities for Black-owned, women- and minority-led, and living-wage businesses.
- Create new green spaces.
- And add community spaces to the Bedford-Atlantic Armory that support the existing men’s shelter.
Traffic calming measures such as increasing the width of sidewalks and the number of traffic crossings, and…
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