Jails in the sky
City plans high-rise lockups in B’klyn, Qns.
The de Blasio administration announced Wednesday that it plans to demolish two borough-based jails and rebuild them as massive lockups.
Constructing huge towers at the Brooklyn and Queens locations is a changeup from the city’s original plan to refurbish existing jails at those spots.
But city officials say they need more room for modern facilities that will have smaller and more open housing spaces for inmates, medical units and places for counseling and education courses.
“This isn’t simply shutting down Rikers,” said Elizabeth Glazer, director of the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice. “This is a complete reshaping of our entire criminal justice system … including bail reform and a zillion other things.”
Glazer and other city officials announced the locations and detailed the next steps in the plan, including public meetings in each borough. Actual renderings, aside from a few cheerful so-called “vignettes,” have not been made available yet.
Under the new plan, each facility will house up to 1,500 inmates and possibly include retail or community space for nonprofits on the ground floor as part of the sweeping plan to close facilities at Rikers Island.
The new jails will rise up to 40 stories and include underground parking, city officials said.
The proposal requires approval through the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure and support from the City Council. Barring any unforeseen holdups, the city plans to submit the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure proposal by the end of the year.
Before the Rikers Island closure can happen, the jail population must be cut from the current 8,300 inmates to 5,000. That will likely require criminal law and bail system changes that must be approved by state lawmakers.
The Daily News reported this month that the city is eyeing 80 Centre St. in lower Manhattan as the new location for a high-rise detention center. The Manhattan Detention Complex, also known as The Tombs, will be turned into housing.
The Brooklyn site at 275 Atlantic Ave. will also house inmates with criminal cases on Staten Island, the only borough where a new jail will not be built.
Currently, people visiting inmates at the Brooklyn location spill out into the street as they wait to be screened. City officials touted how a new jail will have a big waiting area and much-needed underground parking.
The spot in Queens at 82nd Ave. right by the courthouse will include a new aboveground public parking facility and a ground-floor community space.
Queens District Attorney Richard Brown, who is opposed to the plan, has pressed the city to allow his office to move to the new location.
That possibility is being negotiated, Glazer indicated.
The Bronx site calls for building a new jail at the NYPD’s tow pound at 320 Concord Ave. along the Bruckner Expressway. The western area of the site “could be rezoned to a special mixed-use district” for a possible affordable housing development.
Some community leaders have opposed the plan, arguing the neighborhood is illsuited for a new city lockup.
“For generations, lower-income communities in the Bronx have been saddled with an unequal share of New York City’s burdens – garbage transfer stations, industrial facilities, sewage treatment plants – and it was largely people of color who bore the brunt,” said Arline Parks, CEO of local affordable housing provider Diego Beekman Mutual Housing Association. “Today the mayor continued a long, unjust tradition of burdening the most vulnerable.”