Atlantic Yards construction stalls again on apartment tower

Atlantic Yards rendering (Credit: SHoP) and Bruce Ratner
Atlantic Yards rendering (Credit: SHoP) and Bruce Ratner

Two weeks after Forest City Ratner kicked off construction of the first residential tower at Atlantic Yards, work has stalled yet again.

Known as B2, the prefabricated building currently has only three of its blocks on a frame, though previously the developer said that construction would go ’round-the-clock, Atlantic Yards Report, a blog that has been opposed to the project, reported.

Opponents have pounced on the delay, dubbing it “just the latest in an unending string of broken Atlantic Yards promises,” as Eric McClure, founder of neighborhood group Park Slope Neighbors, told the Brooklyn Paper.

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A media event held around the installation of B2’s second block earlier this month, which followed a six-month construction delay for the prefab tower, was not meant to mark the beginning of a new construction period, Michael Rapfogel, a Ratner spokesperson, told the paper. The plan has always been to begin putting the prefab units together in mid-January, he said.

The chairman of Greenland Holding Group, which has invested in Atlantic Yards, slapped an eight-year timeline on the project when speaking with reporters in Shanghai in early November. The state-owned firm has plowed $200 million into the project in exchange for a 70 percent equity interest, and has been slammed by Brooklyn community leaders and critics for not moving fast enough on the construction of 2,250 units of promised affordable housing. [Brooklyn Paper] and [Atlantic Yards Report]Julie Strickland