In the course of my graduate work in urban planning, I spent a lot of time analyzing Coney Island and working with the City (the Coney Island Development Corporation) on a comprehensive redevelopment plan for it. I enjoyed it greatly—I love Coney Island, and it was exciting to work with city officials who were also passionate about it and committed to doing the right thing. I completed my phase of the project two years ago, but I’ve continued to follow the situation closely as an outsider.

As much as I love Coney Island just as it is now—the ocean and the pure summer fun tempered by forlorn, haunted qualities; the old-school New York decrepitude and carnivalesque exuberance—I recognize that it has to change. There are about 40,000 residents of Coney Island, many of them in high rise housing projects on the western end, and the poverty rate among them is high. Job opportunities for residents are few, and given their distance from existing job centers, at least some measure of local economic development is needed.
To my great relief and pride, the direction the CIDC took in 2007 was very encouraging. Despite considerable pressure from Joe Sitt, a disreputable shopping mall developer who has acquired a large amount of property in the existing amusement district, the city told him where he could shove his proposed luxury condo high rises and mall and opted instead to put forward a visionary plan for a revitalized amusement district based in part on the 165-year old Tivoli Gardens
in Copenhagen. Kent Barwick of the Municipal Arts Society praised the city’s plan as meriting an “A for effort—maybe more.”
Unfortunately, Sitt played his hand very well in response. His powerful allies, city councilman Domenic Recchia (D–Coney Island) and State Sen. Carl Kruger, moved quickly to derail the plan. Both of them are personal friends of his and have raked in campaign contributions from him and other developers.
As a result, this spring the CIDC was forced to adopt a revised plan that would leave a tiny token amusement district surrounded by a sea of luxury highrises and dreadful ESPNzone-type entertainment. Dick Zigun, the director of the nonprofit Coney Island USA, carny-showman extraordinaire and the “unofficial mayor of Coney Island,” resigned from the CIDC board in protest and disgust. Basically, Coney Island as we know it will be sterilized beyond all recognition, in a shocking, abrupt and complete turnaround. And despite his victory, Sitt is still holding out for more.

On Saturday I went for the Siren Festival and capped a long day of Coney joy with a stop at Totonno’s, one of the great iconic Brooklyn pizzerias, holding out in Coney on a derelict stretch of Neptune Ave. You ask, was I moved to buy a Totonno’s tanktop? Dear reader, I was, and I did. I consulted the waitresses on size, and got a round of applause from the crowded joint when I emerged from the men’s room wearing it. (For my gusto, certainly not for the size of my biceps).

Sitt has declared his intention to close most of what’s left of the amusement district after this year as he waits out the Bloomberg administration hoping for an even more pliant one in 2009. They can’t tear down the Cyclone, Wonder Wheel, or the boardwalk, but other than that all bets are off. Sitt already has the other relevant public officials in his pocket, so it doesn’t look good. Head out to Coney Island and enjoy it while you can. I never did pursue a career in city planning after completing my degree, and my disgust and despair in the face of this (all too common) sort of vile cronyism was a big part of what discouraged me.