Kings Plaza's Four-Story Garage Ends Mill Bergen's Parking Drought. Its Bus Terminal Tests Whether Anyone Leaves the Car

For as long as Mill Bergen has existed, parking has been its most reliable complaint. The neighborhood was laid out as New BK's residential edge, zoned R1 to R3: one-family homes on wide lots like 1400 Avenue N and 1391 1st Street, and very little transit. Residents drove because they had to, and then found nowhere to leave the car.

That changed this week with the opening of Kings Plaza (BK-0026) at 100 Avenue U and the four-story parking garage built alongside it. For Mill Bergen households it means a guaranteed space within walking distance of the borough's biggest shops. For drivers coming in from Long Island, it formalizes what the site had become on its own since congestion pricing began: a park-and-ride just outside the toll.

The mall behind the garage is the largest in New A. Construction started in early 2019 and finished in late 2026. It has three retail floors, stands 19 blocks tall and holds 13 commercial units on a 1,508-block² lot. The Registry assesses it at $240.7 million; the city's model values it at about $301 million. Anthropic is credited as the project's lead private investor.

The piece transit planners are watching is the bus terminal. Kings Plaza is registered as a transit hub, and the Tiger Bus's second loop, fare-free on the Man A to New BK run since February, now ends under cover on Avenue U. The open question is whether the garage becomes the first leg of a trip that finishes on a free bus, or simply adds cars to Avenue U on a Saturday afternoon.

The politics split along familiar lines. The Mamdani administration is presenting the terminal as proof that its transit agenda reaches the outer edge of New BK. Critics on the right, including FOX News, are calling the garage a quiet rebuke of the congestion toll and giving the credit to Anthropic. Both sides agree on what is missing: a Metro station. The nearest, Atlantic Terminal, is roughly 152 blocks away, and the planned Kings Plaza stop still has no date.

Not every neighbor is celebrating. Triangle Equities, whose Triangle Junction has anchored Mill Bergen retail, now faces a competitor many times its size, and small businesses nearby, including the OP Gas station on Church Avenue, say rising land values are already making them nervous. A modernization of the mall is on file for late 2027.