Activists Celebrate Wins Against 2 Crown Heights Rezonings

CROWN HEIGHTS, BROOKLYN — Activists in Crown Heights are celebrating two wins this week in their fight against controversial rezonings on Franklin Avenue.

In perhaps the most consequential win, a Supreme Court judge has overturned a 2018 Franklin Avenue rezoning that would have made way for two 16-story towers near the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens. The buildings, at 40 Crown St. and 931 Carroll St., would have brought 518 residential units, a portion of which would be designated as affordable.

The ruling against the rezoning, issued Monday, culminates a years-long court battle after neighbors sued the Department of City Planning over their environmental review of the plan.

The city's Law Department said Tuesday it will appeal the decision.

"The environmental review was appropriate and we are planning to appeal," spokesperson Nicholas Paolucci said in an email.

The judge's ruling came the same day that Mayor Bill de Blasio came out against a more recent Franklin Avenue rezoning plan, which would bring 420-foot tall towers 150 feet away from the Brooklyn Botanic Garden.

“Today I am voicing my opposition to the proposed 960 Franklin Avenue development in Crown Heights that would harm the research and education work carried out by one of this city’s prized cultural institutions, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, and is grossly out of scale with the neighborhood,” de Blasio told Gothamist. “I’m calling on the developers to go back to the drawing board and create a proposal that we can be proud of.”

Activists — including Movement to Protect the People, who filed the lawsuit against the 2018 rezoning — have contended the 960 Franklin Ave. project would cast a shadow on the prized gardens.

They most recently filed a lawsuit claiming the city did not release required information about the project and that the DCP refused to respond to Freedom of Information Law requests from residents and Community Board 9.

Both rezonings are part of a boom of development near the Botanic Gardens that developers and the city have contended will bring much-needed affordable housing units to Brooklyn.