Brooklyn's Progress
December 2001

Forest City Ratner Companies broke ground on November 20 for 9 MetroTech Center South, the final building to go up as part of the 16-acre MetroTech Center complex in Downtown Brooklyn. When completed in early 2003, the 19-story office building, located at the corner of Myrtle Avenue and Flatbush Avenue Extension, will have some 670,000 square feet of commercial space. Empire Blue Cross and Blue Shield, New York State's largest health insurer, has leased 322,220 square feet of space on eight floors of the new building to replace its corporate headquarters at One World Trade Center destroyed on September 11. L to R are: Borough President Howard Golden; Albert Ratner, Forest City Enterprises; Ambassador Charles Gargano, Chairman & CEO of the Empire State Development Corporation; Bruce Ratner, President & CEO of Forest City Ratner; NYC Council Member Mary Pinkett; Dr. Michael Stocker, CEO of Empire Blue Cross-Blue Shield; and Michael Carey, President of the New York City Economic Development Corporation.