Local Bibliophiles Crying Foul Over Condo Plan for Brooklyn Heights Library

June 19, 2015 — We've seen what happens when we try to fund public spaces with luxury buildings. Just take a look at Brooklyn Bridge Park. Barely a hop, skip, and a jump away from there, bibliophiles are fighting to prevent the same thing from happening to the Brooklyn Heights Library. Curbed reports that "an epic hearing over a contentious plan to replace the Brooklyn Heights Library with a new, smaller one at the foot of a wedge-shaped 36-story condo building was, in the end, anti-climactic. After hours of testimony from both sides, Brooklyn Community Board 2 postponed a vote on an application involving the sale of the library property to developer Hudson Companies." Opponents of the plan for Brooklyn to get its very own Flat Iron-like building on the triangular-shaped corner of Cadman Plaza West and Clinton Street are crying foul because the new library space is a third smaller than the current space. Furthermore, according to Linda Johnson, president of the Brooklyn Public Library, "[the proposed space] lacks the functionality you'd like to see in a public library," and the library would also lose all the storage space it currently has below ground. It certainly looks like it is Brooklyn Bridge Park all over again. On the one hand, the library wouldn't be lost forever. In fact, it would replace a building originally built partly as a fallout shelter in 1962 that has a broken air-conditioning system. But at what cost? The library and its patrons seem to be getting the short end of the stick. The community board will cast its final vote next week.

Rendering by Marvel Architects