470 Vanderbilt Avenue rendering

The Barclays Center has made some unlikely real estate into potentially very profitable space, the New York Times and Real Estate Weekly reported. The building, at 470 Vanderbilt at the corner of Atlantic Avenue, is shopping for a large retail tenant, Real Estate Weekly said, to take 21,500 square feet of space. GFI Development is looking for tenants looking to capitalize on what is almost certain to be an influx of pedestrian traffic when the Barclays Center arrives. [more]

Islanders star John Tavares and a rendering of the Barclays Center

If flailing attendance and an aging facility don’t force the New York Islanders to the Barclays Center, an asbestos scare at the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum might be the final impetus. The Brooklyn Paper reported that a state investigation found the arena has small amounts of the fiber, in seating areas, hallways and catwalks, that’s believed to cause cancer. [more]

Hydraulic parking

Forest City Ratner will do “everything [they] can to avoid” the controversial stacked interim parking at the Barclays Center that may be necessary, the New York Post reported.

Jane Marshall, an executive vice president at Forest City Ratner, told the public her company was working hard to avoid parking that uses hydraulic lifts to stack cars, which would be necessary to provide the 1,100 parking spaces New York State has mandated for the Barclays Center, until permanent parking is built. [more]

Forest City Ratner CEO Bruce Ratner and Barclays' main concourse

Before Barclays Center developer Bruce Ratner can plan the arena’s debut Jay Z concert slated for September 2012, he’s planning the concessions for the arena, Gothamist reported.

“We are committed to bringing the best of Brooklyn to Barclays Center and to draw on the borough’s dynamic food scene,” Ratner, who’s the chairman and CEO of Forest City Ratner, said in a statement. “Our goal is [to] cast a wide net to make Barclays Center’s culinary experience as quintessentially Brooklyn as it gets.” [more]

The Bergen Tile Company building

Will car-driving Brooklynites be scared off by a Prospect Heights rental that lacks parking?

According to the Brooklyn Paper, that issue is at the heart of a fight between the developer of a 55-unit complex across the street from the Barclays Center and the surrounding community. [more]

700 Atlantic Avenue

Real estate investment firm Waterbridge Capital has completed its purchase of a 105-year-old Brooklyn industrial facility at 700 Atlantic Avenue for $7 million, the Wall Street Journal reported, close the site of the new Barclays Center sports arena.

The company may be planning to transform the building into a retail center, sources told the Journal, in an effort to capitalize on the rapid evolution of the area leading up to the opening of the arena. [more]

Barclays Center

The plan to provide the 1,100 parking spaces New York State mandated for the Barclays Center would require hydraulic lifts for stacked parking, the New York Post reported, which likely means huge parking delays and traffic in the Prospect Heights neighborhood.

The square block designated to be the only on-site event parking area until a permanent lot is erected underneath Atlantic Yards is far too small to accommodate the number of parking spaces required by the state. [more]

From left: Geoffrey Bailey, director of TerraCRG, Triangle Sports, Timothy King, managing director of CPEX, and a rendering of the Barclays Center

National retailers and restaurateurs have been scrupulously scouting for real estate locations near and along Flatbush and Atlantic avenues in advance of the Barclays Center opening this year.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the most recent victim of the growing trend is Triangle Sports, the 96-year-old retailer at the intersection of Flatbush and Fifth avenues. With the weak economy and increased pressure from the national retailers and upscale boutiques that have descended upon the area, Triangle Sports owners felt it would be best to sell their property. [more]

A rendering of the Barclays CenterThe Barclays Center — Forest City Ratner’s massive, controversial arena and residential project in Brooklyn — has inspired many feelings, but they have generally been colorful. No more, the Wall Street Journal reported — the architecture for the residential portion of the project, unveiled last month, ends up doing something the project as a whole has never done: bore people.

Forest City hopes to work with engineering firm Arup and manufacturer XSite Modular to build the modular units they have decided on at a factory space in somewhere New York City — Forest City is looking at sites in Brooklyn, the Journal said. The units would then be shipped to the site. [more]

Promised to be a driver of the Park Slope, Fort Greene and Clinton Hill economy, the Atlantic Yards construction project has retail landlords salivating but is leaving developers and residents wary, the New York Post reported.

The Barclays Center, which will open next September, is driving up retail rents in the area. Many landlords have allowed leases to expire and spaces to stay vacant in recent years in anticipation of higher rents sure to come with the new arena. Retail rents in the area range from $85 to $175 per square foot, with the high-end marking the top of Brooklyn pricing. [more]