MaryAnne Gilmartin and a rendering of a pre-fab tower at Atlantic Yards

Forest City Ratner’s soon-to-be CEO MaryAnne Gilmartin said that the Atlantic Yards’ innovative approach to housing – in particular affordable housing — would define the project in the years to come, the New York Observer reported.

Speaking at a Center for Urban Real Estate dinner at Columbia University’s Low Memorial Library on Wednesday night, Gilmartin said that although the positive feedback on the Barclays Center had been gratifying, “it is the housing component that will truly revolutionize the project.”  [more]

Screenshot of Bruce Ratner The foundation of the first residential tower at Atlantic Yards is being laid down and in May, the 32-story building will rise above the ground, Bruce Ratner, CEO of Forest City Ratner, which is developing the massive Brooklyn project, told Bloomberg News (see the video after the jump). The property is slated for completion about a year from this June, he said. The building, dubbed B2, broke ground in December and is slated to be the world’s tallest modular tower. “We wanted to come up with a method that assured the same kind of pricing and also was less expensive to build, but still as good or higher quality,” Ratner told Bloomberg of the modular construction method…. [more]

From left: renderings of the exterior and interior of B2

Union representatives and contractors accused the city’s Department of Buildings of bending the rules on modular housing for Forest City Ratner’s Atlantic Yards megaproject at a city council hearing Tuesday, according to the watchdog blog Atlantic Yards Report. The DOB allowed the developer to prefabricate housing off-site without the supervision of licensed plumbers, electricians, and steamfitters, the union representatives said, in a clear violation of city regulations. Some said that the developer actively sought the relaxed permissions…. [more]

From left: renderings of the exterior and interior of B2

It was the first notable groundbreaking in New York City without any ceremonial shovels or decorative hardhats. Developer Forest City Ratner today laid the first chassis, a steel box that will form a sort of foundation, in the ground for the Atlantic Yards’ first residential building, which will be the world’s tallest modular tower. [more]

Barclays Center

Eight years in, many opponents of Forest City Ratner’s Atlantic Yards project — and there have been a great deal of vocal opponents — are ceding victory to the developer and going quiet, the New York Times reported.

The $4.9 billion project is far from finished, and the promises of new jobs and affordable housing are still unfulfilled, and yet many community advocates have grown fatigued. [more]

Atlantic Yards

The six towers designated to cover up the Atlantic Yards railyard will not be constructed until seven other buildings are built, according to the Atlantic Yards Report. This revelation marks a change in the development schedule.

An infographic on the Atlantic Yards Report site explains that four towers originally slated to rise between Sixth and Carlton avenues — the site of the railyard —would be developed before seven others set for between Carlton and Vanderbilt avenues. [more]

From left: Forest City Ratner’s Bruce Ratner and MaryAnne Gilmartin and a rendering of B2

Forest City Ratner is slated to set a record in modular construction, the New York Post reported. Not only will the company develop 15 buildings at Atlantic Yards using modular construction, but according to MaryAnne Gilmartin, the company’s executive vice president of commercial and residential development, the construction of B2, a 34-story pre-fab building, will shatter the current record of 24 stories. [more]

Daniel Goldstein

A leader of the opposition to the Barclays Center may have officially lost his battle when the arena opens later this week, but he appears to be on the winning side of a more local real estate battle.

Park Slope neighbors have finally relented in their efforts to thwart Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn founder Daniel Goldstein’s plans to build a three-story extension to the back of the home he purchased last year. Goldstein bought the property last year after winning a $3 million settlement when his Atlantic Yards home was seized to make room for the Forest City Ratner development. [more]

Forest City Ratner’s MaryAnne Gilmartin and a rendering of the tower

Eighteen months after Forest City Ratner began publicly considering using modular construction to build the first residential tower at Atlantic Yards, a final decision is nearly in sight. The firm is building a prototype module this month and will decide by Christmas whether to employ the prefabricated method for the 32-story, 930-unit tower, Crain’s reported. If built, it would be the largest prefabricated structure in the world. [more]

Stephen Palmese

The competition among developers for residential sites in Brooklyn has arguably never been fiercer, and according to the most prolific commercial broker in the borough, that’s because of the size of the available sites. Stephen Palmese, the director of sales at Massey Knakal Realty Services who the New York Observer credited with brokering about 8 percent of Kings County’s $1.5 billion of building sales in the first half of the year, said the smaller square-footage of a typical residential development in Brooklyn has helped fuel demand at a time when massive projects are still seen as risky. [more]