Crisis of confidence hits city’s big projects

With several of the city’s biggest development projects stalled or coming under heavy criticism, and Moynihan Station apparently dead, who or what is to blame is up for debate. Some analysts say that many of the big plans, from the expansion of the Javits Center to Hudson Yards, have been needlessly complicated by the state’s involvement. Ester Fuchs, a political science professor at Columbia University, called the state’s role “primarily obstructionist.” Others say they simply weren’t thought through. Andrea Batista Schlesinger, executive director of the Drum Major Institute for Public Policy, a nonpartisan research center said they “would not have seen the light of day” if they had been.