Amazon increasing its presence in Brooklyn

Ground recently broke on a new Amazon fulfillment center in Red Hook. The facility will add to the tech giant’s ever-increasing presence in Brooklyn and New York City as a whole.
The center will be located on a pier at 280 Richards Street at the former location of the old Revere Sugar Factory, which was torn down in 2009.
Thor Equities oversees the property and formerly planned on constructing a waterfront office at the site, but those plans were abandoned in 2019.
Amazon swooped in and filed permits for a 310,967-square-foot fulfillment center. The new structure will be a one-story manufacturing facility with parking for trucks and vans on the roof. Additional parking will also be available on the ground level.
The fulfillment center will be within eye-shot of the large IKEA store and near the now-shuttered Fairway along the Red Hook waterfront. The Erie Basin Waterfront Park and the Pier 44 Waterfront Garden will also be within walking distance.
Elsewhere in Brooklyn, Amazon recently signed a lease for another facility at 12555 Flatlands Avenue in East New York. The site will function as both a fulfillment center and as a central office hub for the company’s operations throughout the borough. Another East New York location is also coming to 2300 Linden Boulevard.
An Amazon press release about the East New York location states that the facility will aid the company with its “last mile” distribution efforts throughout New York City. Additionally, the release details the company’s efforts to hire local.
The new facilities are continuing a long and tense relationship between New York City and Amazon. Most famously, local and national politicians successfully ended Amazon’s plans to build a new headquarters at Long Island City in Queens.
Additionally, Attorney General Letitia Jame filed a lawsuit against the company this past February on the grounds of inadequate health and safety conditions in a Staten Island fulfillment center.
Locals throughout the city, including in Red Hook, have also complained about the traffic and environmental setbacks that come with an increase in Amazon’s New York truck fleet.