Climate jobs, small businesses and historic districts shape debate over change

Sunset Park’s future is being debated because so many versions of New York meet in one neighborhood: a working industrial waterfront, a major immigrant community, one of Brooklyn’s busiest small-business corridors, a public park with harbor views, and a growing cluster of climate and economic development projects.

One major flashpoint was the yearslong battle over Industry City’s rezoning application, which culminated in 2020. Industry City sought to expand allowable uses at its private waterfront complex by about 1.46 million square feet, including new commercial, educational and hotel uses. Supporters argued the plan would bring jobs and investment. Opponents, including UPROSE, a Sunset Park environmental justice organization, argued that it would accelerate gentrification, weaken the area’s industrial character and fail to create enough working-class jobs for local residents.

During that fight, UPROSE advanced the Green Resilient Industrial District, or GRID, a different vision for a working waterfront centered on climate adaptation, green-collar jobs, industrial retention and community control. Industry City withdrew the rezoning application in September 2020, but the broader debate did not end there.

UPROSE is now pushing GRID 2.0, an updated version of a waterfront plan developed over more than a decade with Sunset Park residents and workers, and is circulating a petition calling on the New York City Council and City Planning Commission to create a Sunset Park Special Purpose District in alignment with that plan. The organization says the district would create enforceable zoning protections for industrial and maritime land, green-collar jobs, clean manufacturing, local ownership and community oversight, while guarding against speculative rezonings, pollution, truck traffic, flood risk and displacement.

The fight is part of a larger struggle over preservation and change. In 2019, the city designated four historic districts in Sunset Park, protecting more than 500 buildings.

At the waterfront, the New York City Economic Development Corporation, or NYCEDC, is moving forward with projects including an offshore wind port at the South Brooklyn Marine Terminal and BATWorks, which NYCEDC describes as a climate innovation hub at the Brooklyn Army Terminal. NYCEDC says BATWorks is expected to support climate technology companies, workforce training and job placement, with the goal of creating about 600 jobs and generating $2.6 billion in economic impact over 10 years.

“Our goal is to ensure that Sunset Park maintains a waterfront where industry, climate action and the community move and work forward together,” a NYCEDC spokesperson said in a statement to the Sunset Post.

BATWorks and GRID 2.0 both use the language of climate jobs and green industry. But UPROSE argues that the difference is fundamental: whether climate development is shaped by a city-led innovation model or by a community-ratified plan rooted in industrial retention, local ownership and environmental justice. The organization has also raised concerns about AI- and tech-centered uses, arguing that the issue is not only immediate displacement but the precedent set by repositioning public industrial land for speculative “innovation” uses.

Sunset Park Solar offers one example of the kind of community-led climate infrastructure UPROSE says GRID 2.0 is meant to expand. The project, developed by UPROSE and Working Power on the roof of Building B at the Brooklyn Army Terminal, was installed in 2025. According to UPROSE, it is expected to go online in time for an early May celebration, and enrollment is still open.

“This project is an example of what happens when a community is able to manifest a vision, and get the support to make it happen,” said Elizabeth Yeampierre, executive director of UPROSE.

Inside Industry City, residents and workers describe a picture that is just as complicated. Some see the complex as a symbol of displacement pressure. Others use it as a place to work, eat, meet friends or run a business.

Jessica, who works at Colson Patisserie in Industry City, said the bakery has grown with the complex, expanding its delivery and catering work across the five boroughs. But Jessica said the owners still want the business to keep a local focus.

“They prefer to reserve the business for the community,” Jessica said of the owners’ priorities.

Ronnie and Xchyo, who live in the neighborhood, were eating breakfast at Industry City when they spoke about the changes they have seen in Sunset Park.

“I love Sunset Park. There is a lot to do here,” Ronnie said.

“People change and prices go up,” Xchyo said. “First it was other neighborhoods like Astoria, in Queens.”

Xchyo said there can feel like a divide between the industrial waterfront and the residential neighborhood, but restaurants and cafés can also bring different groups into the same space.

“I think we should preserve that,” Xchyo said.

Pooran, who has worked at Industry City for five years, said he has seen the complex draw visitors, businesses and workers.

“Everyone can come here to do business and work,” Pooran said. “I think it is very necessary.”

David Estrada, executive director of the Sunset Park Business Improvement District, which serves the Fifth Avenue commercial corridor, said economic development and environmental health should not be treated as opposites.

“Sunset Park deserves a healthy environment and a thriving business environment,” Estrada said. “Those two are not incompatible.”

For Sunset Park, the debate is not simply whether development should happen. It is who shapes that development, who benefits from it and whether the neighborhood’s industrial waterfront can become a center of climate work without pushing out the working-class and immigrant communities that have long defined it.