Ratner tries to cut back on transit improvements

Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner is trying to cut back on transit improvements at the site, the New York Post reported. Ratner is reportedly in talks with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to cut costs for the promised relocation and renovation of The Long Island Rail Road’s Vanderbilt Rail Yard, which Ratner agreed to purchase for $100 million three years ago. Critics of Atlantic Yards are angry because Ratner wasn’t originally the highest bidder for the rail yard site. Meanwhile, WNYC’s Matthew Schuerman spoke to Leigh Anderson, who lives
in the Atlantic Yards footprint, today. Anderson was told in 2003 that
her four-story apartment building would be demolished for the project,
but now construction has stopped on the site, and Anderson’s building
is surrounded by empty lots.