‘Trump Yard’: Locals worry they’ll be cut out of Mamdani, Trump Sunnyside Yard housing plan

Locals in Western Queens have concerns about Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s housing pitch to President Donald Trump for Sunnyside Yards.  Eagle photo by Jacob Kaye

By Ryan Schwach

Western Queens locals are wary of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s plan to collaborate with President Donald Trump to build 12,000 units of housing in the World’s Borough, where the mayor once lived and where the president was raised.

A number of officials and local leaders said on Friday that they had concerns about Trump’s involvement in Mamdani’s proposal to resurrect a city plan to create a new neighborhood atop Sunnyside Yard, which sits just beyond the foot of the Queensboro Bridge and stretches into Long Island City. While many applauded the effort to bring much-needed housing to Queens, they said they wanted a role in shaping the proposal, which they didn’t know was on the table until Mamdani announced it after his surprise visit with the president at the White House on Thursday.

City Councilmember Julie Won, who is running for Congress against a Mamdani-backed candidate and who represents the busy rail yard, was especially critical of the lack of communication.

“Any proposal that reshapes Sunnyside Yard must begin with the neighbors who live here,” she said in a statement. “Our community deserves a seat at the table long before anyone, including the mayor, makes headlines in the Oval Office.”

“I welcome the opportunity to build more deeply affordable housing and other federal investments for public transit and other infrastructure, but it cannot be done behind closed doors unilaterally," she added.

Borough President Donovan Richards struck a more approving tone in a conversation with reporters on Friday. Still, he said he’ll believe the plan, which would cost an estimated $21 billion and require significant federal funding, when he sees it.

“When the check cashes, then I'll truly believe it,” he said. “I don't want to put the cart before the horse, but at the end of the day, the mere fact that this is generating a national conversation around Queens…and Sunnyside Yard, is a great opportunity, especially as we face a looming housing crisis.”

The BP has long been a critic of the Trump administration, but said he has no complaints if the president is involved in bringing such a massive project to fruition.

“Politics makes strange bedfellows, but if our mayor can get something done for Queens County, we're not going to turn it down,” he said.

Richards has been mulling over a potential revival of the Sunnyside Yard project, which was proposed by former Mayor Bill de Blasio, for years. He brought it up with the Adams administration to no avail. His big idea, and one he hopes to push as this project develops, is to put a basketball arena in Sunnyside Yard that would host the New York Liberty. It would be the first women’s-specific venue in the country.

“I think this could be a historic moment, once again, to do something out of the box, something creative, and still address the affordability crisis,” he said.

Both Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Michael Gianaris took a similar tone of cautious optimism in comments to Gothamist.

“Ambitious plans for Sunnyside Yards have come and gone many times over several decades," Gianaris told the outlet. “If Mayor Mamdani can make something happen there that brings thousands of sorely needed affordable housing units, it will be a legacy-defining accomplishment.”

‘Out of left field’

It was a surprise to many when Mamdani came out of the unannounced meeting with the prospective plan to build 12,000 units of housing in Sunnyside Yard.

Most of all for the residents of Western Queens, whose memories of the previous attempt to build over the century-old train tracks are still fresh in their minds.

“The fact that Sunnyside Yard was part of the conversation between President Trump and Mayor Mamdani definitely came out of left field,” said local Community Board 2 Chair Anatole Ashraf. “As a community board – and as a local – we hadn't heard of Sunnyside Yard in a long while. It's been many years since we saw any formal presentation at all.”

Ashraf called it a “true big swing toward addressing the housing crisis,” and said that CB2 is in support of a plan that would bring deeply affordable housing.

“Any proposal to build housing over Sunnyside Yard should reflect that commitment and meet the scale of New York City’s housing needs,” he said.

Mamdani said that he proposed 12,000 new affordable homes, including 6,000 new Mitchell-Lama-style homes, as well as parks, schools and other amenities over the Sunnyside Yard train tracks.

The plan would be the largest housing and infrastructure investment in New York City in more than 50 years, according to City Hall, and would be paid for through a substantial $21 billion in federal grants.

The housing would be built on top of a deck, which would be the largest in the world, constructed over the preexisting tracks.

He pitched the plan to Trump with props.

The mayor’s office brought a custom-made graphic imitating a New York Daily News front page that read “Trump to City: Let’s Build” with the subheadline reading “Trump delivers 12,000+ homes.”

Trump was photographed alongside Mamdani holding up the fake Daily News wood in one hand, with a copy of the infamous “Ford to City: Drop Dead” front page in the other.

Speaking to reporters at an unrelated event in Brooklyn on Friday, Mamdani said that Trump was "interested” in the project.

“The president shared his interest in the proposal, and I am encouraged by the fact that we will continue to talk about this proposal,” he said. “It is going to be a long process.”

“This is a long-standing project that will also require a long-standing commitment, and we're just at the very beginning of it,” he added.

City Hall also said that Mamdani emphasized to Trump the need for affordable housing development, and creating it with less red tape than is normally required in New York City’s land use approval process.

‘We're going to have to do something with that area’

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the New York City Economic Development Corporation had a plan for a mega-development at Sunnyside Yard.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani met with President Donald Trump at the Oval Office on Thursday in a previously unannounced meeting regarding housing development in their mutual home borough. Mayor Zohran Mamdani/X

The proposal was similar to what Mamdani pitched on Thursday – build 12,000 units of housing on top of a massive deck constructed over the preexisting tracks with transportation at the center.

However, the community and every local elected official opposed the plan, which included then Councilmember Jimmy Van Bramer and a still-junior AOC.

Locals felt as though their concerns that the project would be tailored toward luxury developments that priced out locals weren’t being heard.

At one public meeting in 2019, activists stood on tables and shouted “We don’t trust this process.”

One of those in opposition was Danielle Brecker, a Community Board 2 member who previously chaired the board and, at the time, was a local activist running for office.

In a phone call with the Eagle on Friday, Brecker said she remembered the Sunnyside Yard project of old with “a lot of frustration.”

Then a State Assembly candidate, Brecker recalled opposing the plan for its lack of community benefits and local investments, especially in NYCHA.

She now believes, half a decade and a citywide housing crisis later, that housing needs to be built, but by prioritizing infrastructure and pre-existing residents. She and many others made similar points with the recently approved plan to rezone a large swath of Long Island City known as OneLIC.

“I've come to the realization that we're going to have to do something with that area, because having it just sit there is not OK,” she said.

However, she still has her concerns with the plan’s resurrection.

“My frustration with what went on yesterday is more that the mayor kind of talked to the president about this, but never did any outreach to the actual community,” she said. “I don't trust this president at all. I can see it becoming ‘Trump Yard’ and being ugly high rises that no one can afford and no one wants to live in anyway.”

More than anything though, it seems that locals just want to make sure they have a seat at the table.

“Projects of this scale succeed only when local voices are part of shaping how they’re done,” said Ashraf. “QCB2 looks forward to working with Mayor Mamdani and all stakeholders when it moves forward.”

“What matters next is that we have meaningful community engagement,” he added.

Won called for City Hall to commit to a normal land use process for the plan, one where the Council and community are involved.

That might be difficult however, following the passing of ballot propositions last year that stripped the Council of some of its powers over land use.

“I hope that the mayor, who I still have faith in, comes back and comes to the community,” said Brecker. “And I hope the community steps up and doesn't just show up screaming, but comes up and comes wanting to be collaborative. I hope we can come to something that we can all agree on.”