Messier prays city will see light on Kingsbridge Armory dispute

Hockey legend prayed with community for project's success

<em>Rendering of Kingsbridge Armory (inset: Mark Messier)</em>
Rendering of Kingsbridge Armory (inset: Mark Messier)

It looks like the fight over the Kingsbridge Armory is down to a Hail Mary.

Former New York Ranger Mark Messier — whose team nickname was fittingly “The Messiah” — joined a community prayer service on Thursday for his plans to build an ice rink at the Bronx armory, the New York Post reported.

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Messier and developer Ken Parker’s Kingsbridge National Ice Center are currently tangled up in a legal battle with the city over the property’s lease. The Economic Development Corporation has refused to release the 99-year lease for the property until the developers show that they have $158 million in hand for the first phase of the project. Messier and Parker, however, have argued that the state’s Empire State Development Corp. has already committed a $138 million loan. The developers signed the lease with the city in late 2014.

Short of some old fashioned deus ex machina, the parties will continue working out this dispute in court. Bronx Supreme Court Justice Ruben Franco has ordered city attorneys to explain why they’ve withheld the lease at a May 16 hearing. [NYP] — Kathryn Brenzel