Queens Gambles on a New Era at Willets Point: Steve Cohen’s Casino Plan Sparks Hopes and Fears
Written by Blake Utstein
Published December 2nd, 2025
Written by Blake Utstein
Published December 2nd, 2025
For decades, the area around Citi Field was better known as the “Iron Triangle.” It was a swampy maze of auto-body shops, potholes, and streets without proper sewers. Mayors had promised to fix it, with development plans dating back to the 1950s, but Willets Point remained mostly neglected.
Now, the neighborhood is at the center of one of New York’s biggest development fights.
Mets owner Steve Cohen is leading an $8 billion bid to build “Metropolitan Park”–-a Las Vegas-style casino and entertainment district on nearly 50 acres of Citi Field parking lot. The project, in partnership with Hard Rock International, plans to replace the asphalt with a casino, hotel, concert venue, shops, restaurants, and new public park space. The proposal comes as New York State gets ready to award a small number of highly coveted downstate casino licenses.
Willets Point has been targeted for redevelopment for years. In 2008, a plan promising thousands of affordable apartments stalled after lawsuits over building on parkland. More recently, the city approved Phase 1: a 450-seat school, 1,100 affordable apartments, and a new soccer stadium for NYCFC nearby.
Cohen’s casino proposal is designed as the next, much larger phase. His team says Metropolitan Park would include:
A Hard Rock hotel-casino with a full gaming floor
A 500-room hotel and a 5,000-seat performance space
Restaurants, a Queens-themed food hall, and retail
About 25 acres of new parkland, including fields and playgrounds
They also promise infrastructure upgrades, including a major renovation of the Mets–Willets Point 7 train station, and possibly a new pedestrian bridge over Flushing Creek to better connect the site to Downtown Flushing, and bring much-needed investment into a long-neglected neighborhood. The project is pitched as privately financed and, according to the developers, would create roughly 23,000 jobs (most of them union) and generate more than a billion dollars a year in economic activity.
But despite a unanimous vote by the local advisory committee on September 30, 2025, to advance the plan, critics remain. Some community members and elected officials warn that the casino could spark severe downsides, from gambling-related social issues to displacement and environmental stress. These people say what they need instead are housing, schools, and affordable developments, and not slot machines.
Some local officials, including Queens Borough President Donovan Richards, have strongly backed the plan. They argue that Willets Point has been ignored for generations and that this is a rare chance to bring in jobs, amenities, and new green space without relying on city money.
Cohen’s team points to years of community outreach, dozens of workshops, and thousands of door-knocks. In late September, a six-member Community Advisory Committee voted 6–0 in favor of the project after a packed public meeting. Supporters say they’re tired of Willets Point being a dumping ground, and see the casino as a way to finally get more community investment, parks, and year-round activity, instead of just a sea of empty parking.
Opposition, however, is just as intense.
New York State Senator Jessica Ramos, who represents the area, has become one of the casino’s biggest critics. She argues that casinos “extract wealth” from working-class neighborhoods, and that Queens shouldn’t have to rely on a gambling complex to get necessities, like housing and infrastructure. She has called it “unrealistic and unfair” to treat the casino as an economic savior, and refuses to “trade away” public land for what she sees as a predatory business model.
To add on, environmental and park advocates point out that the Citi Field parking lot is legally designated as parkland, next to Flushing Meadows–Corona Park. They've described the project as building a massive casino “in the middle of a public park” and worry about more traffic, pollution, and higher costs of living for surrounding communities.
Housing organizers are also frustrated that promises of affordable housing in Willets Point date back more than a decade and still aren’t fully delivered. They want legally binding guarantees on new housing and local hiring, and not just general pledges and renderings. Some residents felt shut out of the process when a recent public hearing ended with dozens of people still waiting to speak.
Developers respond that the plan now includes an affordable housing component, green infrastructure like solar panels and flood-mitigation measures, and transportation upgrades aimed at preventing game-day gridlock. They insist they will be held to their commitments by elected officials and unions.
Cohen’s bid is not happening in a vacuum. The state is expected to hand out three new downstate casino licenses. Most observers assume two will go to existing racetrack casinos in Queens (Resorts World at Aqueduct) and Yonkers (Empire City), which already have slot machines.
That leaves one final license up for grabs.
Over the past year, several flashy Manhattan and Brooklyn casino plans collapsed after community boards rejected them. This has turned the competition into a kind of borough face-off: Cohen’s Queens project vs. Bally’s proposed casino at Ferry Point in the Bronx–also a multibillion-dollar resort on city-owned land.
Both bids recently passed their local advisory votes, but each comes with political drama. In the Bronx, the casino would sit on a golf course formerly associated with Donald Trump, and the City Council had to be overridden by a rare mayoral veto to keep the project alive. In Queens, Cohen’s plan needed a special state law to build on parkland – a bill that passed in Albany after heavy lobbying, political donations, and behind-the-scenes negotiations over community benefits.
By the end of 2025, the state’s Gaming Facility Location Board is expected to decide which projects get licenses. If Queens is chosen, construction at Willets Point could start relatively quickly, locking the neighborhood into a casino-anchored future for decades.
For supporters, it’s a long-overdue chance to turn a neglected industrial zone into a major destination, with parks, jobs, and new transit improvements. For opponents, it’s a risky bet that could deepen inequality and redirect public land and attention away from housing, schools, and truly affordable development.
Either way, the outcome will shape not just Willets Point, but how New York decides to pay for its “next era”–with cards and slot machines, or with something else.