All three major newspapers are reporting that Forest City Ratner is scrambling to reduce the project's costs while continuing to claim that starchitect Frank Gehry is still on board. “Frank Gehry has not been removed from the project,” said Joe DePlasco, a spokesman for Forest City. “We are continuing to speak with many arena experts and working hard to find ways to build a world class venue in an incredibly difficult economic environment.” FCR has brought in "value engineering" firms, reports the Daily News, and Atlantic Yards report is saying that the arena could end up looking more like Newark's Prudential Center than the fanciful renderings of Gehry's circulated for the past couple of years. Sounds like another bait-and-switch. Or, as Gowanus Lounge put nicely, "it would seem Brooklyn was promised an SL-Class Mercedes, but now, it turns out that a Ford Focus may be delivered."
Atlantic Yards Developer Denies Removing Architect [NY Times]
Cutbacks for Arena, Architect May Go [NY Daily News]
Nets Arena To Be a Little Less Frank [NY Post]
ESDC: Gehry to Control Aesthetics [AY Report]
Photo from the Atlantic Yards webcam
