The Coney Island land grab, buy back saga continues with the Bloomberg administration looking to purchase 10.5 acres of property in Coney Island…property that Thor Equities owns. Devloper Joe Sitt is said to be “ready to give up” on his plans to make his properties into gigantic casinos, malls, condos, and whatever else he had planned that wouldn’t include amusements. This move by the city may just be able to save Astroland, a park that is basically already in the grave with a couple of shovels of dirt thrown on top of it…but there still is some banging coming from the coffin! NY Post reports that “sources close to the deal are saying the price for the land is in the $200 to $250 million range.” This all comes after the city snached up an acre of Deno’s Wonder Wheel Park in October before a deal with Thor Equities could go through.
Considering that the fear was that Joe Sitt and company would buy up the land, rezone it, and flip it, I have to wonder if this was plan C of sorts for Sitt. Plan A was actually develop the property into something (casinos, malls, etc.); plan B (but the preferred plan) was flip the land to a condo developer after rezoning and then roll in the dough. And then there was plan C; if rezoning never happened then Sitt would just give up on the land and have the city buy it back for a small return. Sure maybe he didn’t get a large sum back but in this economy any sort of return is good! Of course said plan C also involves Joe Sitt eating a nicely presented shit sandwich, but hell, who doesn’t want to see that?
Read the entire article: Astroland Hope-City Eyes Coney Land Buy