Judge Blocks City's Proposal for 2 Buildings in Brooklyn

The development of two buildings in Brooklyn has been temporarily blocked by a federal judge, who ordered Friday that the mid-19th-century structures be returned to a designation of federally protected parkland. New York City had approved a proposal to allow one of the buildings, the Tobacco Warehouse, to be used by St. Ann's Warehouse, a theater company based in the Dumbo neighborhood that has been looking for a new home. The city was planning to take proposals for the Empire Stores building this spring, city officials said. But Judge Eric N. Vitaliano said that the National Park Service broke the law when it redrew the lines of Empire Fulton Ferry State Park without public hearings, leaving the Tobacco Warehouse and the Empire Stores, both waterfront structures, outside of the park's borders.