NEW YORK | 138 East 50th ST | 803 FT | 64 FLOORS
 

Midtown East planned rezoning will require complex deal-making
December 17, 2012 04:30PM
By Adam Pincus
Another very tall tower for New York!

Nice to know theres more supertalls on the way.

I'm sure Extell will building something tall, assuming they're still involved with this site by then. Extell was behind the 980 ft convention center hotel proposal.

Good to hear its a parking garage that'll be demoed, as opposed to something attractive.

That stretch is full of gems. I am so happy to see them saved, and that ugly garage going. Bet the design will be something amazingly cool? :D

Extell? Woow ... They are controlling the city. :runaway:
I hope to see something tall here.

It could eventually be another developer, and not Extell that builds here. There are currently smaller hotels on site. It will be consolidated into one footprint shown below (# 17)


http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/145716670/original.jpg


Google maps view of the site and surroundings (right side)...

Lexington
http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/147949134/original.jpg


50th Street
http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/147949135/original.jpg



http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/147949136/original.jpg



http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/147949137/original.jpg



http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/147949139/original.jpg



Currently the largest building on site is the W New York...

Dick Johnson NYC
http://farm7.staticflickr.com/6139/5...8e31b9db_z.jpg



http://farm7.staticflickr.com/6149/5...39cb75a1_b.jpg


It would be opposite one of the great hotels of Manhattan, the Waldorf...

Dick Johnson NYC
http://farm7.staticflickr.com/6013/5...77763d7f_z.jpg


And accross from the Benjamin...

Dick Johnson NYC
http://farm7.staticflickr.com/6013/5...eba10450_z.jpg



Site 16, the InterContinental, could also be redeveloped with another large hotel...

Dick Johnson NYC
http://farm7.staticflickr.com/6141/5...b0b90030_z.jpg

The InterContinental isn't great, but the loss of The Benjamin would be tragic. Hopefully it is preserved...

The Benjamin isn't a potential site for development, at least as of now.

NY's planning department is crazy if it allows any of those beauties to be destroyed. What is wrong with NYC? That is going too far. NY will soon be Hong Kong on Hudson. :koko: Although I love modern towers, I'm actually now hoping that the rezoning fails now just because NY doesn't care enough about its heritage and won't even try to incorporate some of the nice facade elements into new towers. The developers unfortunately are just not interested. The Interconnie and the W are nice buildings, they should be saved, or at least the facade should be. If this keeps happening, NY will look like any Asian city and lose it's unique mix of old and new. Soon all the great old hotels will be few and far between in NYC... the Hotel Penn is doomed too.

Amanda Burden must be a paper tiger, or else she has no taste.

Excepting the Intercontinental, I don't think any of these hotels are development sites.

They're talking about using air rights from properties like the Benjamin. Most of these older hotels are either landmarked or built to maximum FAR anyways.

I hope you are right, it would be a ridiculous shame to see those towers fall.

As for the Intercon, why don't they force developers to incorporate some of the base facade elements into new towers.. The top of the old girl is dull, but the base stupendous.

I don't even love the base on the Intercontinental. NYC has so many pre-war gems, and this is not one of them. If the goal in NYC is to save all pre-war architecture it should be preserved, but that is not the goal.

Too often people make blanket statements that pre-war architecture is beautiful. Much of it certainly is, but there is a major chunk that isn't worth saving. People build shlock now, and they did the same in the 20s-30s.

If all these mediocre pre-war buildings were going to be replaced with stunning designs, i wouldn't blink an eye. However, there is nothing to force developers to replace them with something decent.

They could easily keep the arcade at the bottom of the W hotel, or the arches in front of the Intercon. Stuff like that earns my respect and it would retain some of the essential classic NY feel of midtown while still modernizing office space.

There is the zoning. The designs must meet approval. There's both pro and con to that side of the argument, but that's something else.

The specifics of this site as called for with the rezoning:

currently
800,269 sf total
756,099 hotel space

possible with rezoning
924,893 sf total
54,211 sf footprint
870,682 hotel space plus 54,211 sf of retail (gives you the total from the article)

total increment of space
124,624 sf

This is a total of all buildings on site, which must be consolidated to form a single buildable site. These are the lot sizes that will be added to give us the total:

24,725 sf
1,882 sf
5,682 sf
1,840 sf
10,041 sf
10,041 sf

Any news on this one?

The rezoning hasn't even passed through the bureaucratic channels yet. You're going to have to wait a while.

Ok it can take as long as it wants :)

There needs to be a stipulation that the buildings can only be demolished once the developer has secured financing for their new development. If this had been done before the crash of 2008, then this city would have a lot more buildings today. The crisis of 2008 wasn't the last, and there will be far worse economic crises in the future.

It's not that simple. Sometimes, a ready to build site is more attractive (to potential tenants). There's active competition in Manhattan and demolition can't always be done "overnight". Financing usually comes after the tenant. In terms of residential sales, timing could also be a factor.