As 2004 draws to a close, Gothamist can't wait to see what happens in 2005 when it comes to the West Side Stadium plan. Last week, NJ senator Frank Lautenberg wrote letters to the EPA and Federal Highway Administration to see if they can find some reasons why the stadium shouldn't be built, which isn't totally surprising since the NY Jets are trying to abandon Giants Stadium. Gothamist wonders if Lautenberg shouldn't be contacting the Department of Health, because the stadium is, as much as the Jets deserve a stadium of their own, goddamn fugly. Even the city's own City Planning Chair, Amanda Burden, is forced to admit the design "could be better" in an interview with the NY Times:
We've been pushing the Jets very, very hard to improve the design - I am very intent on doing that. It should be an exciting experience.
Hmm. Gothamist just wants to warn the city, the Jets organization and other West Side Stadium supporters that opponents are probably looking for some protected birds that live in the Hudson Yards vicinity and stage rallies to prevent any building. We can see it now, Cablevision's James Dolan is sitting in a car with binoculars, putting the Audobon Society on speed dial.
Gothamist noted the ugliness of the plan when NY Times architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff called the Kohn Pederson Fox design "mind-numbing." And here's the City Planning office's Hudson Yards overview.
