If there was any question left about the suburbanization of Brooklyn (see Atlantic Center, IKEA, Costco), it will be answered by the creation of a Red Hook mall. Turns out, developer Joe Sitt of Thor Equities doesn't want to just bring BJ's to the waterfront but a whole six-story shopping center. Well, at least the vision is mixed-use and includes some adaptive reuse, too. The Brooklyn Paper says Thor wants "to renovate a historic warehouse on the former Revere sugar refinery; erect several new buildings for shopping, parking and housing; and create a 40-feet-wide public esplanade by 2011 along the water’s edge of the Beard Street property next door to the recently opened IKEA." How do these developers — see Thor, Ratner, even Toll Brothers — have so much power over such historic and important Brooklyn sites, especially the waterfronts? (Also, yes, the Brooklyn Paper continues with the double entendre headlines.)
Hookers to Get BJs in Mall [The Brooklyn Paper]
Thor's Red Hook Plans Come Into Sharper Focus [Curbed]
Red Hook Ikea. Photo by masck.
