UPDATE: RALLY LOCATION CHANGED DUE TO RAIN. CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFO.

The sponsors of the BrooklynSpeaks.net campaign are planning “Rally Against Demolition for Parking” on April 15 at 2:00 p.m. It will take place on Pacific Street between Carlton and Vanderbilt Avenues — the location of one of the proposed parking lots. Supporters and opponents alike are welcome to join the rally and hear music from the Lafayette Inspirational Gospel Choir and from singer Dave Hall.

“The goal of the rally is simple: to send a clear message to Governor Spitzer and Mayor Bloomberg that New Yorkers deserve better than demolition for parking,” said Sue Wolfe, president of the Boerum Hill Association.

The rally is planned to call on the state to reverse their approval of developer Forest City Ratner’s plan to demolish two city blocks — including the historic Ward Bakery — to create three enormous parking lots for 1,400 cars.

“Whether you support or oppose Atlantic Yards, the immediate reality of the project is not going to be the promised jobs and housing, but enormous surface parking lots that will blight Brooklyn for decades,” said Gib Veconi, member of the Prospect Heights Neighborhood Development Council.

Forest City Ratner describes the parking lots as temporary because they plan to construct the second phase of the project on them. But experts — including the project’s own landscape architect, Laurie Olin — speculate that the second phase will not be finished for 20 years or longer.

“Providing 1,400 surface parking spaces next to the third largest transit hub in the city is not only unnecessary, it is contradictory to the whole rationale for the project’s location,” said Jon Orcutt, executive director of the Tri-State Transportation Campaign.

“No other large-scale project in the city has required the demolition of two city blocks for parking,” said Andy Wiley-Schwarz, vice president of Project for Public Spaces. “This is 1950s-era Detroit-style urban planning.”

The BrooklynSpeaks.net campaign was initiated in September 2006 to provide a platform for New Yorkers to push for major changes to the Atlantic Yards project. The campaign was organized by Atlantic Avenue LDC, Boerum Hill Association, Brooklyn Heights Association, Fifth Avenue Committee, Municipal Art Society, National Trust for Historic Preservation, Park Slope Civic Council, Pratt Area Community Council, Project for Public Spaces, Prospect Heights Neighborhood Development Council and the Tri-State Transportation Campaign.

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