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By Colin Mixson
Brooklyn Daily
The city’s plan to build a “hurricane proof” bathroom along the water in Brighton Beach will make residents in a nearby condo bullseyes for projectiles that storms could rip off the comfort stations, residents claimed at a court-ordered public scoping meeting at the Shore Front Y on Monday.
Residents of the Oceana Condominiums pointed out that he railings, ramps, and stairways leading up to the 12-foot-high comfort stations are designed to break away from the main structure during severe tidal surges, which would turn them into dangerous debris during the next superstorm.
“There’s nothing to say that whole trailer park on stilts won’t be flying into our building,” said longtime Oceana resident William Vafakos.
The city has been trying to build the elevated toilets along Brighton and Coney Island beaches to replace the old bathrooms destroyed by superstorm Sandy last year, in a project funded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
A local environmental advocate said the design flaw not only impacts the people living near the looming loo outside Oceana, but also calls into question the other comfort stations that have already been built.
“Since these buildings are all identical, if there’s a flaw in the design of one, then all of these structures are now suspect,” said activist Ida Sanoff.
The Parks Department had begun building the comfort station outside Oceana earlier this year, but the Oceana Homeowner’s Association, representing 865 condo units, sued the city in March for not having conducted an Environmental Impact Review.
A Kings County Supreme Court Judge recently ruled against the city, forcing the Parks Department to conduct the review, which began with Monday’s public scoping meeting.
Prior to the meeting, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D–Fort Greene) rallied with Oceana condo owners on the Brighton Beach Boardwalk near the comfort stations, where he called on the city to find a less controversial spot for their high-rise toilets.
“The Brighton Beach community deserves to be treated with dignity and respect. The Parks Department should abandon its plans to build a comfort station at the location in controversy, and come to the negotiating table to discuss a more suitable placement,” said Jeffries.
The breakaway ramps were not the only design flaw that the condo owners brought up during the scoping meeting, and Vatakos says the city’s new bathrooms would send more than debris flying through his windows.
“On a very nice day, when the breeze comes off the ocean, we’ll be the ones getting the stench of human excrement coming from those bathrooms,” he said.