NEW YORK | Hudson Yards; 40 msf of development [Archive]

NYguy

Feb 4, 2007, 7:12 AM

NY Times

Residential Towers to Sprout Soon on Far West Side

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A rezoning of a 310-acre stretch of factories, parking lots and warehouses on the Far West Side has led the way for plans for residential towers.

By CHARLES V. BAGLI
February 4, 2007

The developer H. Henry Elghanayan likes to be at the head of the line.

He said that his company, Rockrose Development Corporation, was one of the first to build new residential towers in Lower Manhattan and the West Village and at Queens West in Long Island City and Battery City Park.

This month, Mr. Elghanayan will be the first developer to start building a residential complex on the Far West Side of Manhattan, which is the direct result of the Bloomberg administration’s rezoning of a 310-acre stretch of factories, parking lots and warehouses for large-scale development two years ago.

Rockrose is constructing 44-story and 24-story apartment buildings on opposite sides of 10th Avenue, between 37th and 38th Streets, in what has been officially renamed the Hudson Yards district. “Once people see that we are indeed going forward,” Mr. Elghanayan said, “you’re going to see an explosion of growth in that whole area.”

Builders are already flocking to the once-sleepy Hudson Yards, an area crisscrossed by bus ramps and Lincoln Tunnel entrances.

Indeed, a half-dozen developers plan to start residential projects there in the next six months, with a combined total of nearly 6,000 apartments, 20 percent of which will be for low- and moderate-income families.

There are also five slim-budget hotels either under construction or in development on the block bounded by 39th and 40th Streets, between Eighth and Ninth Avenues.

Most developers say that commercial towers will be slower to follow in a district that stretches from roughly 30th to 42nd Streets, west of Eighth Avenue. But Brookfield Financial Properties is talking to at least one investment bank interested in its office site on Ninth Avenue, between 31st and 33rd Streets.

City officials say they are making progress on plans for the $2.1 billion extension of the No. 7 subway line from Times Square to 11th Avenue and 34th Street, which, they add, will spur the development of office towers in the area. The Bloomberg administration sold $2 billion in bonds in December, much of it for the subway project. It hopes to issue the tunneling contract later this year and begin construction.

The city is also working with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority to devise a plan for selling the development rights over the West Side railyards, which sit on both sides of 11th Avenue, between 30th and 33rd Streets. “There’s an extraordinary amount of activity going on, precipitated by high rents in Midtown,” said Daniel L. Doctoroff, deputy mayor for economic development. “You’re really beginning to see the outlines of what Hudson Yards is going to look like.”

But just north of the yards, the fate of the long-planned expansion of the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center is up in the air again, at least temporarily. Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s administration has said that the convention center is one of several projects “under review.” According to hotel industry executives and city officials, Mr. Spitzer has questioned the wisdom and cost of the $1.7 billion project, in part because of the vertical nature of the expansion, which runs counter to the horizontal layout of most convention centers.

Critics contend that adding floors to the convention center could make it more difficult and expensive to present successful trade shows and conventions. Some state officials prefer an expansion that would go south, over the West Side railyards.

That, however, would clash with the Bloomberg administration’s plan to develop residential and commercial towers on platforms over the railyards. It could also affect the three developers and hotel operators who submitted competing bids to build a 1,500-room hotel across 11th Avenue from the convention center.

But it remains to be seen what the Spitzer administration will do with the convention center after the review. Patrick J. Foye, chairman of the Empire State Development Corporation, declined to comment.

Mr. Doctoroff said he respected the governor’s right to evaluate the project and would participate in those discussions.

“There will be no ideal solution as long as Javits is still there and you want to continue to operate it during construction,” he said. “We continue to believe it is a very good solution and we ought to go ahead with Phase II at the same time.”

The second phase, however, could add $1 billion to the price and require closing the convention center for several years. The hotel industry has no enthusiasm for raising the $1.50 a night room tax dedicated to the expansion plan. City officials have suggested raising the tax to $2, noting that average room rates soared 12.6 percent last year.

Mr. Doctoroff and the transportation authority have met with real estate developers and community leaders to discuss the eventual sale of development rights over the railyards in August. The initial plan called for rights to be sold to one or two developers, who would build platforms over the yards for residential and commercial towers. But most developers now say that government should finance the platform construction, which could cost $1 billion.

There is also debate over whether the development rights should be sold to one developer, or divided and sold to a variety of builders, a strategy that could generate more money over time for the transportation authority.

Developers also want the city to demolish the elevated railroad line, known as the High Line, that hugs the western and southern perimeter of the railyards. That proposal is opposed by several community groups, which want to see the entire length of the High Line converted to a park.

In the meantime, the residential juggernaut continues. The developer Joseph Moinian is starting work on a $760 million, 60-story apartment tower on the north side of 42nd Street, west of 11th Avenue, next to his 46-story Atelier condominium tower.

Directly across 42nd Street, Larry Silverstein is close to starting construction of two 58-story glass towers, where 20 percent of the 1,276 apartments will be set aside for low-income families. An adjacent 16-story building will have 83 apartments for moderate-income tenants. The new buildings will be next to the River Place complex that Mr. Silverstein built in 1999.

All five buildings, designed by the architect Costas Condylis, sit within the Hudson Yards district. The area differs from most of the district in that developers have long been able to build high-rises along 42nd Street.

At the southeast corner of 10th and 42nd Street, Stephen J. Ross, chief executive of Related Companies, said he expected to start construction this spring on a roughly 60-story tower with 500 apartments, 250 hotel rooms and a set of theaters.

The Dermot Company said it would start building its $450 million Hudson Mews project, two 18-story buildings over platforms on opposite sides of 37th Street, west of Ninth Avenue, along with a public park. Stephen Benjamin, a principal at Dermot, said the company was completing its financing and negotiations with the Port Authority to buy development rights over ramps leading to the Lincoln Tunnel.

Farther east, on the north side of 37th Street, Glenwood Management plans to break ground later this year for a 24-story building with 550 apartments.

Jeff Levine of Douglas Development expects to start this spring on a 34-story building with 370 apartments just outside the Hudson Yards district, at the southeast corner of 30th Street and 11th Avenue.

Like most of the developers, Mr. Moinian is bullish on the future. He has bid in partnership with the Marriott hotel chain to build the convention hotel and banquet hall. He also owns two sites for commercial projects in the area, although he cannot begin construction for at least five years because the sites lay within the path of the subway extension.

“Our commitment to the area is very, very strong,” Mr. Moinian said. “There’s no question that this is the next part of town where the action takes place.”

Dartagnan

Feb 6, 2007, 12:46 AM

Anyone know anything about the commercial Skyscraper planned for Hudson Yards zoning plan "development site #5" which is on the west side of 10th Avenue between 34th and 35th Streets?

NYguy

Feb 7, 2007, 12:38 PM

NY Post

BUILDING'S REALLY WIRED
AP'S 33RD STREET HEADQUARTERS SOLD FOR $700M+

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http://www.nypost.com/seven/02072007/photos/biz038.jpg

The Daily News Building (above) at 450 W. 33rd St. has been sold.

February 7, 2007 -- SCOTT Lawlor's Broad way Partners have swooped in and tied up 450 W. 33rd St. for north of $700 million.

The chunky former John Hancock Building is being almost entirely recapitalized by Joseph Chetrit and his investors through Douglas Harmon of Eastdil Secured.

A slender tower of about 800,000 feet can be added to the 1.7 million foot chunky, sloping structure that's home to both the Daily News and the Associated Press wire service.

Harmon confirmed to us the deal went to contract but would not discuss any of the details of the complicated transaction.

"They are evaluating how best to maximize the value of the assets," Harmon said of Lawlor's group.

As we revealed in last week's column, the building was on the market but it has become obvious that buyers have to move fast to grab that brass ring.

NYguy

Feb 14, 2007, 12:42 PM

NY Times

M.T.A. Says It Can’t Handle Cost Overruns on No. 7 Project

By WILLIAM NEUMAN
February 14, 2007

The new leadership of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority signaled yesterday that it had deep concerns over a deal with the city to build a $2.1 billion extension of the No. 7 subway line, saying the authority did not have the money to pay for possible cost overruns or other additional expenses.

“It is M.T.A.’s position that we are under no legal obligation to absorb any additional costs or overruns,” Elliot G. Sander, the new chief executive, wrote in a letter to Assemblyman Richard L. Brodsky, a Westchester Democrat. He was responding to a letter from Mr. Brodsky expressing concerns that the project could exceed its budget. Mr. Brodsky made Mr. Sander’s letter public yesterday.

In an interview yesterday, Mr. Sander said he would not grant any contracts to proceed with the work until the financial issues were hammered out.

Under the project, the No. 7 line, whose western terminus is Times Square, would be extended to the Javits Convention Center on the West Side. The city and the authority signed a deal in September in which the city agreed to pay for the project and the authority agreed to be in charge of design and construction. The city, however, capped its contribution at $2.1 billion.

Mr. Sander said the authority’s long-term spending plan for major projects was already handicapped by widespread cost increases.

“At this point our position is that if there are cost overruns, we’re not in a financial position to be able to assume those,” Mr. Sander said. He said paying for any part of the No. 7 extension could jeopardize other projects, like the Second Avenue subway, a Long Island Rail Road link to Grand Central Terminal, and maintenance of the transit system.

He said other unbudgeted costs had to be considered, including a projected $150 million for new subway cars needed to run on the extended line. Mr. Sander, who inherited the deal when he took over the authority in January, said he spoke yesterday to Daniel L. Doctoroff, the deputy mayor for economic development, to explain the authority’s position.

“We want to get it done, but we have to work through these financial issues,” Mr. Sander said.

Mr. Doctoroff said the discussion was premature because there was no indication that the project would exceed its budget. “Our view is that we certainly had an understanding and that the city would be responsible for all costs up to $2.1 billion and that the M.T.A. would bear the responsibility for costs above that,” Mr. Doctoroff said. “We’re going to sit down and talk, but our view is, the deal is the deal.” Both Mr. Doctoroff and Mr. Sander said they believed that the project would go forward.

Mr. Brodsky, the chairman of an Assembly committee that oversees the authority, said in an interview he feared that hidden costs could harm the authority’s bottom line.

“If we keep to the basic principle, which is the city will pay and the M.T.A. will build, we’ll be O.K.,” Mr. Brodsky said. “But right now there are hundreds of millions to almost a billion dollars of costs that the M.T.A. would probably have to absorb that would endanger the Second Avenue line, the East Side link and other parts of the capital program, and that is simply unacceptable.”

NYguy

Apr 13, 2007, 11:37 AM

Finally, back to the railyard development...

NY Sun

Colossal Plans for Hudson Yards
City Soon To Request Proposals

By ELIOT BROWN
April 13, 2007

The city is about to unveil its preliminary proposal for the 26-acre Hudson Yards site over the MTA's rail yards, a colossal development that is said to include about 13 million square feet of an undetermined mix of residential and office space.

The project, which could be handed over to a single developer, would be substantially larger than either the World Trade Center redevelopment or the Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn.

Nearly two years after the city lost its bid to build a stadium on the West Side site, the Bloomberg administration and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which owns the rail yards site, will come forward with design guidelines at the end of the month, a city official said. It plans to issue a request for proposals in May.

At least four major developers are working on bids for the mega-project, according to the president of the Real Estate Board of New York, Steven Spinola. The cost of the project — including the task of building a platform above working rail yards — is so high that Mr. Spinola said developers could seek to partner with pension funds or private equity funds to foot the bill. He said current market conditions and the expected abundance of office development around Penn Station to the east would probably lead a developer to build mostly apartment towers.

Numerous officials and others involved in discussions say there are many points of contention regarding the brisk timeline and design guidelines, particularly the MTA's insistence on flexible guidelines that do not offer specifics about the makeup of buildings or infrastructure. By not setting out detailed requirements for a developer, the MTA could expect to attract higher bids, though community leaders say issues such as "affordable" housing and public infrastructure should be agreed upon at this point in the process so as to ensure its eventual approval through the city's uniform land use review.

"It's an extremely ambitious project in terms of its size, and it's also ambitious in terms of its time frame," Mr. Spinola, who has been involved in discussions regarding the guidelines, said. "The MTA is anxious to have the deal done, and done quickly."

The giant swath of land west of Pennsylvania Station is one of the last remaining large undeveloped spaces in Manhattan. Despite the failed stadium bid, numerous projects such as the no. 7 line subway extension, the pending expansion of the Jacob Javits Convention Center, and improvements to Hudson River Park would reinvent the area west of Midtown when combined with a development over the yards.

The site atop the existing rail yards was a cornerstone of the city's failed bid for the 2012 Olympics, as it would have included the main stadium on the western half of the area and a cultural center and office towers over the eastern half.

After the bid failed in mid-2005, the city eventually negotiated a deal with the MTA in which the transit authority would take responsibility for the bidding process, and any new development would go through the city's land use review process. The city initially wanted to buy the western yards from the MTA, though it dropped its plan late last year and settled on the existing plan, for which future developers will give payments in lieu of taxes to help fund the no. 7 subway line.

The land over the eastern half of the rail yards was rezoned in 2005, and the current design guidelines being created pertain only to the western half, which would be rezoned by the developer or developers that win the bidding process.

In order to create a project of this scale that could successfully move through the city's land use review process, the MTA and the city agreed to create the designs with significant input from stakeholders including the development industry, the City Council, and the community.

While the various parties have yet to reach an accord, the city and the MTA are still hoping to request bids on the project starting next month.

To the concern of community members, the city appears to be leaning toward demolishing a stretch of the High Line, which could be transformed into an elevated stretch of parkland on the western half of the yards.

"I would like to see as much of the High Line stay up as possible," state Senator Tom Duane said in a phone interview. "I know that there are other stakeholders that don't necessarily agree with that."

The chairwoman of a land use committee at Community Board 4, Anna Levin, who has been involved in discussions with the city and state, said that while the city has been pushing against the High Line, the MTA has been working to create a site plan that lacks specificity, a point that several officials involved in the process have confirmed. Ms. Levin said she and others have been pushing for the design guidelines to include specifications about affordable housing, building placement, the inclusion of infrastructure, and a school.

Restrictions on construction can limit developers' expected returns, and thus bids for the project would likely be lower than without the regulations. While there have been some differences and the timeline has been accelerated, Ms. Levin said she does not believe the project is highly contentious.

A spokesman for the MTA, Jeremy Soffin, said the agency is committed to working with the city and other parties to find a solution "that will provide vital funding of the MTA's capital needs and ensure a wonderful addition to the West Side community."

It is thought that bids for the development could bring in hundreds of millions of dollars to the MTA, and the agency's seemingly aggressive push for a more lucrative plan is consistent with the Spitzer administration's pledges to exact more from developers in large projects on public land.

While revenue for the MTA is important, the president of Manhattan, Scott Stringer, said in an e-mail that other needs have yet to be worked out.

"We still have a ways to go — especially on affordable housing and open space — before we have the consensus needed to move forward," Mr. Stringer said.

The city plans to disclose its initial design guidelines at a public meeting at the end of the month, according to an official familiar with the process. From there, the city is aiming to issue its request for proposals by the end of May.

The requests for proposals are for both the eastern and western halves of the rail yards, and the city official said the project does not necessarily have to be completed by a single developer.

Once the developer is selected, it will conduct an environmental review and seek project approval from the City Council and the city's planning commission.

Scruffy

Apr 13, 2007, 6:02 PM

end of the month. OK awesome. this is exciting. 13 mil sq feet!

austin356

Apr 13, 2007, 6:55 PM

Is the zoning still the same as outlined in the OP links? For some reason I thought I saw those a few years ago, and was wondering if everything is the same?

Well personally I think the FARs are to stingy. I mean come on, Atlanta, one of the worlds most suburban cities, has base FARs of over 30. I really think the area would be best off by not having any restrictions on density, or at least absurdly high restrictions such as FARs of over 50.

There is very little space to develop in the whole nation, let alone Manhattan, to do such a project, and it should accordingly be done to its absolute greatest potential. If they zone it supertalls will come!!

Overall, imo, it is just sad to see what could be one of the best urban districts in the world, be instead limited to a standard urban district.

NYguy

Apr 14, 2007, 11:38 AM

Is the zoning still the same as outlined in the OP links? For some reason I thought I saw those a few years ago, and was wondering if everything is the same?

Well personally I think the FARs are to stingy. I mean come on, Atlanta, one of the worlds most suburban cities, has base FARs of over 30. I really think the area would be best off by not having any restrictions on density, or at least absurdly high restrictions such as FARs of over 50.

Manhattan FARs are that way because the city is so dense. It's the FARs together with regulations, such as setbacks, that give the city its vitality without sacrificing too much.

Zoning for the railyard development isn't complete.

NYguy

Apr 16, 2007, 2:33 PM

These graphics better explain how the size of a building relates to city zoning...

http://hellskitchen.net/csdc/slide/img007.gif?
hellskitchen.net

http://hellskitchen.net/csdc/slide/img009.gif
hellskitchen.net

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hellskitchen.net

NYguy

Apr 17, 2007, 6:39 PM

A look at some of the development sites, and potential development (both commercial and residential) they could bring....posted in the convention center hotel thread:

eastern railyards ( 3 towers)
size 570,000 sq ft max far 11 max fa 6,270,000

four corners
site 705a size 40,116 sq ft max far 33 max floor area 1,323,828

site 705b size 71,203 sq ft max far 33 max floor area 2,349,699

site 706a size 46,634 sq ft max far 33 max floor area 1,538,922

site 706b size 67,452 sq ft max far 33 max floor area 2,225,916

site 707a (hotel site) size 57,007 sq ft max far 24 max floor area 1,248,168

site 707b size 64,205 sq ft max far 24 max floor area 1,540,920

site 708a size 57,694 sq ft max far 24 max floor area 1,246,190

site 709a size 63,819 sq ft max far 21.6 max floor area 1,378,490

site 710a size 69,547 sq ft max far 20 max floor area 1,390,940

site 711a size 36,800 sq ft max far 20 max floor area 736,000

site 1069a size 83,160 sq ft max far 20 max floor area 1,663,200

site 708b size 43,000 sq ft max far 15 max floor area 645,000

site 709b size 57,712 sq ft max far 15 max floor area 865,680

site 710b size 54,040 sq ft max far 15 max floor area 810,600

site 711b size 22,500 sq ft max far 15 max floor area 337,500

site 1069b size 17,533 sq ft max far 15 max floor area 262,995

site 733a size 19,750 sq ft max far 13 max floor area 256,750

site 734a size 19,449 sq ft max far 13 max floor area 252,837

site 735a size 38,049 sq ft max far 13 max floor area 494,637

site 1050a size 28,664 sq ft max far 15 max floor area 372,632

Brookfield site
site 729a size 128,600 sq ft max far 19 max floor area 2,443,400

site 729b size 80,729 sq ft max far 19 max floor area 1,533,851

site 729c size 137,310 sq ft max far 21.6 max floor area 2,965,896

site 728a size 16,775 sq ft max far 21.6 max floor area 362,340

http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/77328203/original.jpg

_____________________________________________

Greater detail on each site beginning on page 31
http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/hyards/hy_development_information.pdf

NYguy

Apr 17, 2007, 6:50 PM

Some of the commercial sites...

http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/77328205/original.jpg

NYguy

Apr 25, 2007, 11:25 AM

Observer

Behold, a Mini-City Rises
It’s Canary Wharf on the waterfront. Millions of feet of office space, thousands of apartments—Bloomberg’s developers dream big in the Far West Side

http://observer.com/files/imagecache/article/files/Schuerman-JeffKatz6.jpg
Jeff Katz.

by Matthew Scheuerman
April 24, 2007

Five years ago, Mayor Michael Bloomberg painted a utopian picture of the future of New York on the canvas of the disjointed tenements and taxi garages of midtown west.

It was to be a city where college-educated office workers would walk to work at brand-new office buildings with floor plates the size of football fields. A tree-lined boulevard, broader than Park Avenue, would slice up New York’s bulky street grid and draw pedestrians down to a gigantic civic complex with a gigantic football stadium.

The boulevard was called Olympic Boulevard; the stadium, Olympic Stadium.

Remember those days?

The Mayor’s aides called the plan for the new West Side “magnificent,” “the single best investment in our future,” “monumental” and a blueprint to create “one of the world’s great urban places.”

The slides of what the neighborhood would look like in 20 years bore a certain resemblance to socialist-realist art, complete with messianic rays of sunlight streaming down to an area as tall and dense as Madison Avenue.

And guess what? It’s all coming true—sort of.

Even now that the ill-fated football stadium and Olympic bid—which were, after all, supposed to act as catalysts for the new development—have fallen by the wayside, the new neighborhood is taking shape. Some 20 projects are somewhere on the drawing board, and a few others have already broken ground.

The ones furthest along are the residential towers, since it will take until 2012 at the earliest to complete the real engine of the West Side: the extension of the No. 7 line west to 11th Avenue and south to 34th Street. Still, even office developers, energized by a bullish midtown commercial market, are publicly discussing new buildings for the district, even if only to advertise their availability to prospective tenants.

“A lot of things are happening faster than what we expected, given the state of the real-estate market, with rents just going through the roof and building prices following that trajectory,” said James Parrott, deputy director and chief economist for the Fiscal Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank. “It seems like the attention that will be given to the Far West Side will begin sooner than it otherwise would have.”

The plan was supposed to provide about 24 million square feet of office space (the equivalent of about nine Freedom Towers), and 12,600 new apartments, in the 45-block area from 29th Street to 42nd Street and from Eighth Avenue to the Hudson River. The tax revenue from the commercial buildings would pay back the $2.1 billion borrowed to build the extension of the No. 7 subway line down 11th Avenue.

“This plan will do for New York what Canary Wharf has done for London,” said Jeff Katz, president of Sherwood Equities, which owns both commercial and residential property in the district. “In order for Manhattan to remain one of the most critically important financial centers, it needed a place to grow. We didn’t really have a place to grow before Hudson Yards was put into place.”

In contrast to Canary Wharf, which is about three miles away from London’s traditional financial district, Hudson Yards is nearly adjacent to midtown Manhattan. It remains to be seen whether the same type of star-studded architecture will take hold in the West Side’s former warehouse district as it did in London. Right now, experienced (if critically unacclaimed) architects like Costas Kondylis and Gene Kaufman have work going up. Sir Richard Rogers, Kohn Pedersen Fox, and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill—all of which also designed for Canary Wharf—have projects on the table.

But if the area does get developed according to plan, it will, more than any other business district in the city, have all been built from the ground up, without regard to historic preservation, in the span of a mere 30 years.

Plans have a way of biting back, however. In the two years it has taken for big-league developers to gather investors, draw up blueprints and sort through the thick regulations, nimble upstart builders have erected budget hotels on whichever parcels they found available.

In fact, on one block, just south of the Port Authority Bus Terminal, five budget hotels—called ‘pencil hotels’ because of their tall, narrow shape—have sprouted up, feeding the hunger for hotel rooms near Times Square and the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center.

Needless to say, however much the city likes its tourists, this isn’t what New Yorkers had in mind for a brave new West Side.

“This is what the market does,” said Joe Restuccia, executive director of the nonprofit Clinton Housing Development Company. “Someone comes along and says, ‘I can pay a lot of money for that site and build a cheap hotel and make a lot of money.’ Who would ever think that so many of them would cluster in this one place?”

Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff told The Observer that the hotels didn’t concern him much, precisely because they are concentrated on one block on the eastern side of the site.

“If you remember the zoning, we anticipated relatively lower-scale building between Eighth Avenue and Ninth, and Ninth and 10th, and that’s where most of this development is occurring,” he said. “The area that is going to go through the biggest change is between 10th and 12th avenues.”

Residential development is, meanwhile, taking shape along two arteries: 42nd Street and 37th Street. On the far western end of 37th Street, near and along 11th Avenue, Baruch Singer—known for buying up large swaths of run-down tenements in Harlem—is planning two 40-story-plus hotels. Mr. Singer told The Observer that he is speaking with major hotel chains and planned to break ground by the end of the year.

Five of the residential developers in the area overcame a major obstacle last month when they struck preliminary agreements with the state Housing Finance Authority for tax-exempt bonds to finance their structures. The bonds require developers to set aside 20 percent of the units for low-income households, but the high demand—and limited supply—for such cheap financing had threatened to forestall the Hudson Yards development indefinitely.

“For us, 37th Street was the most civilized of the options,” said Jon McMillan, planning director for the Rockrose Development Corporation, which broke ground on one building and is nearing work on another. “It doesn’t pass by any of the Port Authority infrastructure; it has been developing with cultural and retail options, and it is where the most things have been planned so far.”

That “infrastructure” is the spaghetti of entrance and exit tunnels and ramps to the Lincoln Tunnel and the Port Authority Bus Terminal that dominates the northeast end of the Hudson Yards. One of the key real-estate deals to smooth out the terrain is a pair of mid-rise apartment complexes on either side of 37th Street between Ninth and 10th avenues. Called Hudson Mews North and South, the Dermot Company project will be built on a platform above the Lincoln Tunnel entrance and exit ramps—a challenge that has taken longer than expected to surmount.

“The engineering and technical details of building on that site have been worked out, and we are looking for the most cost-effective way of satisfying the Port Authority and other engineering requirements,” Dermot president William Dickey told The Observer. “This is rather a unique situation. There is no other project like this in the city or in the Port Authority system.”

Mr. Dickey said that when the Port Authority first agreed to give the air rights to the Dermot Company, the two parties had hoped that ground would be broken this summer, with December as the outside date. These days, December is looking more realistic. The cost of the air rights is one part of the negotiations.

Though residential use is supposed to dominate the northern and eastern ends of the district, office towers are supposed to be arranged in an “L” shape, north-south along 11th Avenue opposite the newly reborn Javits Center and east-west in the low 30’s. Key to the southern corridor are the Metropolitan Transportation Authority railyards, which have yet to go out to bid.

But it’s telling that two landlords are willing to discuss some details of their projects.

Brookfield Properties, which owns most of the block between 31st and 33rd streets on the west side of Ninth Avenue, is drawing up plans for four towers. Mr. Katz, the president of Sherwood, has come up with a schematic plan for his 11th Avenue parcel to show off to financial companies.

Mr. Katz said he would not start without securing an anchor tenant—which is normal practice for office buildings—but both the Sherwood and Brookfield parcels are large enough to provide the 65,000-square-foot trading floors that investment banks like J.P. Morgan Chase are now looking to build at the World Trade Center site.

There are still several balls in the air, however, that community leaders who have helped to shape the plan say could make all the difference. Next month, the M.T.A. is supposed to put the eastern and western railyards—including the former site of the Olympic stadium—up for bid. The $1.7 billion expansion of the Javits Center, which was supposed to be one of the anchors of the new development, is being re-evaluated by the administration of Governor Eliot Spitzer.

And who knows just how far along private developers and the state are toward moving Madison Square Garden a block west, ripping the lid off of the subterranean Pennsylvania Station, and constructing another five million square feet of space in the vicinity? That’s a massive amount of supply that, even according to the city’s own estimates, would suck away developers’ interest from further west.

“I’m very skeptical they are going to get the railyards plan under way, and I think if nothing happens on the railyards now, then it’s in a generation,” said Anna Levin, co-chair of the land-use subcommittee for the local community board. “If you live in New York any period of time at all, you know that it is impossible to tell what sort of development will happen.”

Originally published in The New York Observer newspaper on 4/30/2007.

NYguy

Apr 25, 2007, 11:41 AM

Graphic from the article...(Observer)
http://www.observer.com/2007/page/new-west-side-project-project

http://www.observer.com/sites/all/themes/observer/MidtownMap0424_G.jpg

1) The Atelier 635 West 42nd Street
2) 605 West 42nd Street
3)River Place II 600 West 42nd Street
4) 10th Avenue and 42nd Street
5) Javits Convention Center Expansion
6) 37th Street and 11th Avenue
7) 505 West 37th Street
8) 455 West 37th treet
9) 37th Street between Ninth and 10th avenues
10) Hotel Galerie
11) 37th Street, between Eighth and Ninth avenues
12) 11th Avenue, between 35th and 36th Streets
13) 11th Avenue between 34th and 35th Streets
14) 11th Avenue between 33rd and 34th Streets
15) 34th Street and 10th Avenue
16 & 17) 30th to 33rd streees, 11th to 12th avenues
18) Ninth Avenue between 31st and 33rd streets
19) Eighth and Ninth avenues, 31st to 33rd streets
20) 316 11th Avenue

NYguy

Apr 25, 2007, 7:47 PM

The Real Deal

Hudson Yards suitors ID'd

April 24, 2007

Redevelopment of the 26-acre site will cost billions. It's a huge catch, and it's no surprise that some of the city's biggest firms are taking the bait.

Five developers are currently cooking up redevelopment plans for the MTA's Hudson Yards site, according to a member of Community Board 4, which oversees the West Side area in the 30s that includes the 26-acre site. The Related Companies, Brookfield Properties, Vornado Realty Trust, Tishman Speyer and the Durst Organization are in the process of preparing bids to develop the site, according to the community board member.

A private consultant familiar with development plans for the Hudson Yards site confirmed that the five firms are all in the process of preparing bids.

Most of the firms already have significant holdings in the area. Vornado and Related have plans to develop Moynihan Station a few blocks a way, and Brookfield owns a 4.7-million-square-foot parcel between 31st and 33rd streets where it intends to construct an office complex.

The MTA will likely gain hundreds of millions of dollars from the sale of its long-unused rail yards. The cost of redeveloping the yards, which run on the east and west sides of 11th Avenue from 30th to 33rd streets, is expected to run in the billions. Hudson Yards will be the single largest development in the city when it gets under way, and it is anticipated that it will include a substantial amount of housing.

While an official request for proposals from the MTA is not expected to be released for several weeks, the city and the transit authority have already prepared guidelines for the site's redevelopment that could help guide potential bidders in the planning process.

The HYDC intends to unveil the current design guidelines at a town hall meeting on May 8.

Community Board 4 has been working with the HYDC on the design guidelines via a community advisory committee. The community board is concerned that the design guidelines currently planned by the HYDC are not adequately addressing affordable housing, additional public infrastructure investment and preservation of the High Line. The northern terminus of the under-construction High Line Park is part of the Hudson Yards site, and it is being considered for demolition.

The Bloomberg administration pushed to build a stadium on the site two years ago as the centerpiece of the city's bid for the 2012 Olympics.

By John Celock

A look at the west side yards where the 13msf development would grow:

http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/36749820/original.jpg

http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/36749821/original.jpg

NYguy

May 21, 2007, 11:11 PM

http://home.businesswire.com/portal/site/google/index.jsp?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20070521006082&newsLang=en

Joint Venture of Hill International, LiRo Engineers, Lemley International and HDR Receives Contract to Manage the Extension of No. 7 Subway Line in New York City

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The joint venture of Hill International, LiRo Engineers, Lemley International and HDR has received a contract from the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority to provide construction management services during extension of the No. 7 Subway Line in New York City.

The project will provide transit access to the West Side of Manhattan, including the Jacob Javits Convention Center, by extending the No. 7 Line westward from Times Square under West 41st Street and southward along Eleventh Avenue to the southerly terminus at West 25th Street. The planned extension provides 7,200 feet of tunnel to accommodate a two-track railroad with two lay-up tracks for the storage of six trains (three on each side). The extension also provides for two new stations; an intermediate station at West 41st Street and Tenth Avenue (Tenth Avenue Station) and a two-track terminal station on Eleventh Avenue at West 34th Street (34th Street Station).

The joint venture will be responsible for providing construction management services during all tunneling work and during construction of all facilities and infrastructure including track, rail systems and stations, as well as project controls services throughout the duration of the project, which is anticipated to be completed by November 2013.

About Hill International

Hill International (Nasdaq:HINT), with 1,500 employees in 70 offices worldwide, provides program management, project management, construction management, and construction claims services. Engineering News-Record magazine recently ranked Hill as the 17th largest construction management firm in the United States. For more information on Hill, please visit our website at www.hillintl.com.

About The LiRo Group

Established in 1983, The LiRo Group is currently ranked among the nation’s top 25 construction management firms (Engineering News-Record) and is one of New York’s leading engineering and construction management firms. LiRo’s 350-plus staff help design and manage the construction of some of the region’s largest and most complex public works projects. Visit our website at www.liro.com.

About Lemley International

Lemley International has extensive experience in construction management, consulting at all levels for major construction projects and is currently collaborating with Parsons 3D/International as project managers of the historic Idaho Capitol restoration and expansion. Lemley is globally recognized for managing construction of the Channel Tunnel between England and France. For more information on Lemley International, please visit our website at www.lemleyinternational.com.

About HDR

HDR is an employee-owned architectural, engineering and construction firm with approximately 6,000 professionals in 140 locations worldwide. All of them are committed to helping clients manage complex projects and make sound decisions. HDR has 400 professionals in seven offices in the New York metropolitan area. Learn more at www.hdrinc.com. HDR is ranked No. 19 overall in the Engineering News-Record Top 500 design firms and No. 9 in transportation.

NYguy

May 31, 2007, 1:02 PM

http://www.nysun.com/article/55574

City Is Seeking To Build a Giant Parking Lot Near the Hudson Yards

By ANNIE KARNI
May 31, 2007

Almost two years after the city's failed attempt to build a football stadium on Manhattan's far West Side, the construction of the stadium's accompanying parking lot is moving ahead.

The city is planning to build a 950-space underground parking garage on the far West Side that is expected to cost about $125 million, a consultant for Walker Parking Consultants, Andrew Hill, said yesterday. The city is expected to issue a request for proposals soon to attract a private developer to pay for the construction, design, and management of the lot, he said.

The mammoth underground garage, which would stretch to 36th from 34th Streets between Eighth and Eleventh Avenues, was included in the original rezoning of the Hudson Yards area two years ago, and was originally planned to accommodate Jets fans who drove into the city for games at the stadium.

Community residents say they view the garage as an extravagant relic of the city's failed stadium bid, and are opposing the creation of the large garage that they say could bring more traffic to their neighborhood. Proponents of the parking garage argue that even without a football stadium, the redeveloped area would need a large garage to support an expected influx of residents and office workers to the area.

"Now that the stadium's gone, the parking lot doesn't make a whole lot of sense," the co-chair of Community Board 4's transportation committee, Christine Berthet, said. "The community is opposed to this. We support the extension of the no. 7 train line and the planning for how to bring people to the Javits Center shouldn't be for people to come by car."

The rezoned Hudson Yards, which stretches to 42nd Street from 28th Street between Eighth and Eleventh Avenues, is expected to included 24 million square feet of new office development, 13,500 new units of housing, 1 million square feet of retail space, and 2 million square feet of hotel space.

Several of the city's biggest developers, including Extell Development Company, Vornado Realty Trust in partnership with Douglas Durst, as well as Brookfield Properties and Tishman Speyer Properties, are expected to bid on a project that could cost as much as $1 billion to build platforms over the rail yards that would support residential and commercial skyscrapers. The parking lot would be just to the north of the rail yards.

The Hell's Kitchen Neighborhood Association is also raising a lawsuit against the city arguing that the parking garage violates the federal Clean Air Act, which set a cap of 7,000 on the number of parking spaces that could be created below 60th Street in Manhattan. The new zoning for the Hudson Yards project exceeds the federal cap, a plaintiff in the suit, Daniel Gutman, said.

A spokeswoman for the Hudson Yards Development Corporation was unavailable for comment yesterday.

NYguy

Jun 19, 2007, 8:34 PM

http://www.therealdeal.net/breaking_news/2007/06/08/1181339804.php

City and Extell buy property near Hudson Yards

June 8, 2007
By John Celock

The city appears to be buying up buildings next to the far West Side's Hudson Yards in order to build the Hudson Boulevard, which planners envision as an eight-block thoroughfare running from 42nd to 34th streets between 10th and 11th avenues. In a deal that recently closed, the city spent $66.1 million to buy 528 West 34th Street and a smaller adjacent building, 524 West 34th Street. Mega-developer Extell Development Company kicked in another $13.9 million to buy part of the properties, according to public records.

Extell, which is rumored to be planning a bid to develop the Yards, is also said to be eyeing development possibilities in areas near the Yards, according to J. Lee Compton, the chairman of Community Board 4. Gary Barnett, the president of Extell, did not return a call seeking comment on the purchase.

The building, a Federal Express distribution center between 10th and 11th avenues, sits on land the recently released Hudson Yards development guidelines have designated part of the Hudson Boulevard, which will run south from West 42nd Street, connecting to parks planned for the center of the new development. The planned parks in Hudson Yards, meanwhile, will connect to the existing Hudson River Park that runs parallel to the West Side Highway. In 2004, the city planned to seize the property via eminent domain in order to make way for the No. 7 train line extension, according to reports.

According to Compton, the city has been acquiring buildings on the planned boulevard via eminent domain for the past 18 months. Public records show the purchase of 528 West 38th Street is registered to the city's Law Department, which oversees eminent domain proceedings. Lisa Bova-Hiatt, the deputy chief in charge of condemnation in the Tax & Bankruptcy Litigation Division at the Law Department--who represents the city on the purchase of property via eminent domain--was unavailable for comment.

The boulevard was originally conceived as an entrance to the stadium the Bloomberg administration wanted to build on the 26-acre Hudson Yards site two years ago. The city failed to win public support for the planned stadium.

In July 2005, Community Board 4 sent a letter to the city's Law Department stating that they were against the plan to use eminent domain to obtain properties for Hudson Boulevard. The letter also stated that with the stadium no longer on the table, that the board found the boulevard to be unnecessary.

"Once the stadium went away, the city did not see a need to eliminate this useless boulevard," Compton said. "It takes up an awful lot of space for not much, and it's a strange thing to be doing."

Compton noted that the community board has been fighting for the city to pay the property owners a competitive rate as they condemn the buildings for the construction of the boulevard.

The Hudson Yards development guidelines call for the 26-acre site to hold both residential and commercial buildings, topping off as high as 50 stories. The plan has generated recent controversy over the amount of affordable housing that will be offered on the site, the need for the construction of infrastructure to support an influx of residents, and the preservation of the High Line along the Yards' southern border.

The MTA originally promised to release the request for proposals to develop the Yards by the end of May. An MTA spokesman now says the RFP will be released soon, but did not give a firm timetable for the release. The delay in releasing the RFP calls into question the MTA's May statement that review of bids would begin in the early fall. While the RFP has not been released, several developers are reportedly preparing bids for the site, which the MTA expects will sell for around $1 billion.

NYguy

Jun 29, 2007, 12:27 PM

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/2007/06/29/2007-06-29_last_dance_at_the_copa.html

Last dance at the Copa
City rolls a 7 & hot spot's 3rd version to fold

http://www.nydailynews.com/img/2007/06/29/amd_copa1.jpg

Desi Arnaz and wife Lucille Ball dine in 1946 at club's E.60th St. incarnation.

BY XANA O'NEILL
June 29th 2007

The storied Copacabana will close its doors tomorrow night - forced out of its plush West Side digs by the city to make room for the No. 7 subway line extension.

"It's like you're being evicted from your apartment with no place to live," said club owner John Juliano. "They just come over and throw you out."

The three-floor, 50,000-square-foot building at 34th St. and 10th Ave. will be razed to make way for a new subway terminal.

"We gotta have a Copacabana," Juliano said as he contemplated the ornate white palm trees and crimson seashell carpet in the club's main room. "I'll pass it down to my children and my grandchildren."

Many notables have passed through the Copa since it moved to its West Side address five years ago - after spending some 10 years at W. 57th St., and about 50 years at its original home on E. 60th. St., where it opened in 1941.

Juliano recalled the time former President Bill Clinton took to the stage in the main room last year and told the crowd that he'd rather play sax at the club than be out on the campaign trail.

And the time several months ago when Marc Anthony leaped onto the stage for a surprise performance when he and wife Jennifer Lopez came to see Johnny Pacheco. "That was fun," Juliano said, beaming.

The club owner said he hasn't yet found a new facility to house the Copa, which was the inspiration for Barry Manilow's 1978 hit song "Copacabana."

Juliano said he's hoping to be in a new home by the end of the year and has been eyeing potential properties with more than 30,000 square feet in Manhattan and the Bronx.

"We'll find another spot, and people will follow us," he said. "We have the biggest nightclub name in the world."

Latin megagroup El Gran Combo is slated to be the final act tomorrow. Juliano said he will host Copa acts several nights a week at his upper West Side club, Columbus 72.

"It will be sad," said Claudia Olivares, 29, assistant to the general manager at the club. "We've felt like this for a few months now. It's a sad countdown for us."

___________________

Sunday, July 1 is the last chance to dance at NYC's legendary nightclub, the Copacabana. In January, owners announced that the club would have to move by July 1 to make room for an expansion of the 7 subway line.

http://www.nydailynews.com/img/2007/06/29/gal_copacabana13.jpg

http://www.nydailynews.com/img/2007/06/29/gal_copacabana12.jpg

This is not the first time the nightclub has changed locations. This 1946 photo shows doorman Harry Schwartz in front of the original location at 10 East 60th Street.

http://www.nydailynews.com/img/2007/06/29/gal_copacabana2.jpg

... then-Vice President and Mrs. Richard Nixon in 1954 ...

http://www.nydailynews.com/img/2007/06/29/gal_copacabana4.jpg

In 1999, Jose Alberto performed for Salsa Night at the Copacabana's second location: 617 West 57th Street.

http://www.nydailynews.com/img/2007/06/29/gal_copacabana10.jpg

Tito Puente also came to the West 57th St. location, for the 1999 Suited For Success (Welfare to Work Initiative) benefit.

NYguy

Aug 29, 2007, 10:43 PM

http://www.metropolismag.com/cda/story.php?artid=2911

Saving It: Bruce Fowle, Principal of FXFowle @ ICFF 2007

August 15, 2007

Bruce Fowle: FXFowle is part of the team that is expanding the Javits Center. It’s an ongoing process that we’ve been involved with for a year and a half. There are budgetary situations and we’ve had a change of governor in Albany so we’re going through a lot of reevaluation. But I can tell you what the goals are and what we are hoping to do insofar as making the building as sustainable as possible.

When the request for proposals came out for this project they were clearly looking for people with a lot of convention experience, a superstar on the international level, and a lot of know how. We formulated a team, starting with Epstein Group out of Chicago who had done the McCormick Center and then decided that we should invite Richard Rogers, who is a particularly green, socially conscious architect, to join us. We also have Flack + Kurtz as the engineers, Leslie Roberts and Associates as the structural engineers, Ken Smith is doing the landscaping and we have VJ Associates doing the cost estimating. We won the job.

FXFowle has been pioneering green architecture since 1995 when we started the Condé Nast Building, which was the first green skyscraper in the country. It is still one of the most talked about green skyscrapers. A disappointment for all of us was how long it took for the marketplace to catch on and start doing this as a matter of course, but it is finally happening here in New York.

A few other projects we’re working on right now include a building for a software company out of Philadelphia called SAP that is going for platinum-rating. We did the preliminary design work for the Second Avenue subway and that is also going to be very green. Just how much gets into the final budget is hard to say at this point. But we thoroughly analyzed all green aspects of that project. The Helena is the first voluntarily green high-rise residential building, certainly in New York, maybe in the country at this scale and it is gold rated. The school of management for Syracuse University, is not LEED rated but has many green features to it. We do a lot of planning work which is transportation oriented, primarily in trying to make planning as green as possible. There is another subway project out in Queens with photovoltaics. And then there’s a new project for the Center for Global Conservation at the Bronx Zoo.

You’ve all experienced the entrance sequence at the Javits Center where you have to get here by taking a taxi or a bus. It’s not very convenient and has a lot of disadvantages. The Javits Center was designed ahead of its time, which is to say, it’s an all-glass building but the glass performance was not as great as it could be today, so it’s very dark. The service access is limited and very poor. It’s actually the eighteenth largest convention center in the country. For New York to be that far down the totem pole for convention center size is not a good thing. That is the main impetus to try to enlarge it.

There are some wonderful views of the river from the building and from the river of the building, but unfortunately it’s very hard to get those. There are only a couple of places in the building where you can actually enjoy the view. We’re trying to establish more synergy between the waterfront and the convention center.

There is a lot of sky lighting in the entry part but when you get down into the main exhibition halls there’s absolutely no daylight. This is an industry problem because the industry is not excited about natural light, although some of the new convention centers in Boston and Pittsburgh actually do use a lot of natural light. You can always put shades to black it out when necessary.

The space we’re in now has a very low ceiling space by convention center standards. When you get upstairs with the loftier spaces it’s much higher. The most successful part of the Javits Center is probably the main entrance hall. The problem is that about 50 percent of the energy that goes into this building is in the lighting and it’s not necessarily the base building lighting but all the exhibition lighting. The lighting provided by the decorators in the industry and the lighting used my most exhibitors is very high-energy consuming. Half the energy goes into lighting. The other half is in heating and cooling.

Take a look at the existing area photograph. You can see where the highway runs across and where the Hudson River Park is being expanded. There are a number of issues in terms of urban design that we are faced with here. All of these streets are blocked. There’s been a lot of pressure to put the convention center over the rail yards.

Instead of being the black opaque façade that you see from all angles, we’re trying to enliven and animate the Javits Center. We want to bring vitality to the street and make Eleventh Avenue an important and vibrant thruway. In the master plan approved by the city a couple years ago, there is a plan to put a green swath through here. There will be all new high-rise development on both sides of the avenue. The master plan for the rail yards has just been released. It will include a major cultural center and high-rise development, as well as a lot of open land for park space.

The original idea was that we would expand the Javits Center to the north from 38th Street to 40th Street. There’s a big bus garage there which is very difficult to relocate because we have to have a bus garage somewhere. It’s a “not in my backyard” issue and there’s very little opportunity to change that. Some other buildings are in demolition right now. The idea was to create some parks and try to convert the area into residential and commercial buildings that will provide some equity for the development corporation as well as to enhance the 34th Street corridor.

Trucks are a major problem. There’s a staging area for trucks that come in from all over the country. Those that don’t fit end up parked out on these streets, sometimes idling all night long. The drivers will sleep in the trucks. For an area that’s trying to be developed as a major new center of commerce in the city, it’s just not good. So one of the programmatic issues we’re dealing with is to try to get the trucks off the street and provide a truck marshalling area.

We’re also proposing a new hotel and all these sites will eventually become high-rise buildings contributing to a very high-density area.

The original idea was to add about 360,000 square feet of exhibition space and about 200,000 square feet of meeting room space, which would bring the total exhibition space up to about a million square feet. That puts us in the big-time. One of the problems we have right now in the convention center is that the percentage of meeting room area to the exhibition hall is very small. It needs to be about 30 percent.

We’re trying to create open land, which is a mandate from the city. It’s also part of the environmental impact statement. There’s a new number 7 line subway that’s going to start here which is an essential part of this project. You will be able to take the subway here and not have to take a bus or a cab. When you leave tonight you’re going to find it’s not always easy to get a cab because it’s just not an area where the cabs hang out.

If you look at the proposed façade, you can see the magnitude of the expansion. It’s about two million square feet of expansion over all. The problem is that because of funding and programmatic needs, and the huge escalation of costs, we are now reevaluating all of this. We’re focused on adding something entirely new on the north end. Part of the problem is we have to maintain the existing facility. Every square foot that’s here now has to be operational through the construction period. We can relocate to new construction but we have to do it in phases and with a 10 percent escalation every year.

We also have a problem with Local Law 86, which is the new green mandate for city-funded projects. They have requirements that are different from the state, which are called Executive Order 111. We’re trying to sort out who controls what aspects and which one we have to follow because this is both a state and a city project.

We have to deal with the condition of the existing building. The roof leaks like a sieve. Mechanical systems are terrible and antiquated. Whether we deal with the existing basis on a permanent basis or a temporary basis is all very much in question. Convention industry standards, their lighting standards for example, are basically nonexistent in terms of being sustainable.

We are aiming for LEED Silver. We believe it’s all possible but in the current state of flux it’s very difficult to get a grip on exactly where we’re going to get these points. Energy is the primary issue. The system is extremely poor as it exists today. By centralizing the system, we expect to reduce the existing energy consumption by about 60 to 65 percent, which is good. That’s primarily with a central system of high-efficiency boilers and chillers, heat transfer mechanisms, premium efficient motors, variable flow, and high-efficiency at reduced capacity.

If we can get the lighting industry, or the exhibition industry, to take it to the next step, we can be saving a lot more energy. We are also providing for future photovoltaics. There’s just no way under the current budget situation that we could imagine actually installing photovoltaics at the moment. I think we’re all waiting for that technology to make itself more profitable, with a shorter payback. The idea is to provide a roofscape that can handle a significant amount of photovoltaic cells.

We had looked at ice storage, we had looked at geo-thermal, at least. a lot of these systems just don’t pay off because the system is either too big or because they buy energy at a different scale. It’s not like you or I would buy it for our house, they buy it at a large package rate. Saving energy to make thermal storage at night, for example, does not really save energy, but it saves cost normally. It is not really effective in this case.

We know that we can make the exterior more efficient by replacing the glass as it is right now. But we also know that the existing mullion system is not thermally broken and it’s not going to be that much better if we can change that glass when we have all of the metal radiating through. We’re still working on that, and we’re talking about external canopies for the glass, screen walls and so forth.

Susan S. Szensasy, editor in chief, Metropolis: It’s interesting to see the retrofit, not just the addition. When you look at this building, it is in hopeless shape; coming at it in certain angles, that film is peeling, and then the inefficiency must be tremendous. The mayor has this incredible NYC 2030 plan, which asks to bring buildings up to high performance standards. Is the Javits Center going to be one of those that retrofits? Will it become an example for the city to think about how our building stock can be updated and can be more energy efficient?

Fowle: We hope so. The 2030 plan which Susan refers to is Mayor Bloomberg’s new proposal. It’s got 127 initiatives. It’s really wonderfully worked out and includes aspects like how close anybody in the city should be to a park, how close you should be to a school, how close where you work or live is to public transportation, and so forth. I think the number 7 subway line expansion is a major step. Adding the green space will be a major step. And the proximity of the river of course, and adding some permeability between the city and the river is very important. We wish we could do more of that.

As far as the existing building is concerned, we have yet to determine whether this is going to mean starting a new building with the ultimate plan to demolish the existing one, or to rebuild it, or whether we do a sort of stopgap solution, so it’s difficult to say. If it’s a stopgap solution, we have to convince the public that that’s what it is and that ultimately this will be a green, very much in keeping with the 2030 plan.

Szenasy: You have a dynamite team in place—FXFowle, Richard Rogers, Ken Smith—and all of the people that you gathered are incredibly skilled in these areas. Is there a plan for that team to figure out an education program for the people who run the convention center? To make sure that the lighting begins to be energy efficient and that they don’t put something really offensive in there? You’ve designed this amazing skin and you’ve retrofitted, you’ve created this new world, and then if they don’t do the right thing they’ll still be losing 50 percent of the energy in the lighting.

Fowle: I can’t say there’s a plan but there is the desire. The problem is that there is a whole industry that takes care of convention centers all around the country. They’re the people who get your convention center set up. Frankly their interest does not appear to be making things greener. Their margins are very tight. They’re more concerned with issues like how fast they can get in and out of the convention center, where their people stay, where the trucks sit, and how accessible all of their supplies are. They supply the panels, lighting, the hook up, the booths, etc. We are once removed from that because our client is what’s called the Convention Center Development Corporation, which is a branch of the Empire State Development Corporation. And then the convention center operations group is really another group and we are trying to create a synergy between the two. The people who do the set up work are once removed from them, so it’s really difficult for us to get to them. The ultimate goal would be to write guidelines and set standards that people can try to aspire to and really try to change the industry.

Szenasy: I do hope that happens because what we’re seeing right now is that the architects and the engineers come up with these great systems and then the users override the systems. It’s been really difficult for the past few years. People are used to a certain amount of light and if they’re not educated enough in what you’re trying to do they’re going to override you and then you’ve done all this great design for nothing.

Fowle: Yes, I think creating awareness within an industry is probably the first thing that needs to be done. I think they probably don’t realize that their lighting is consuming half the energy of the entire building.

Szenasy: I didn’t realize that. That’s huge.

NYguy

Aug 29, 2007, 10:47 PM

Images from the story
http://www.metropolismag.com/cda/story.php?artid=2911

http://www.metropolismag.com/webimages/2911/6-Drawing.jpg

“This was the last image we pulled together as an architectural team for a typical section of the front of the building. I can’t promise that it’s going to look like this at all, but you can see the kind of saw-toothed roof which would have photovoltaics on the lower-angle pieces facing south and natural light coming in to the meeting rooms, probably two levels of meeting rooms on the top that will filter the light through, but not likely to bring it all the way down into the exhibition spaces. The landscaping in the foreground is just an idea of how we can create something that’s soft, something that’s very welcoming and sort of enhancing the whole human experience as you come to the convention center.” —Bruce Fowle

http://www.metropolismag.com/webimages/2911/1-Javits.jpg

The existing Jacob K. Javits Convention Center

http://www.metropolismag.com/webimages/2911/2-siteplan.jpg

Left: proposed site plan; right: existing site plan

http://www.metropolismag.com/webimages/2911/3-siteplan.jpg

Proposed site plan

http://www.metropolismag.com/webimages/2911/4-elevation.jpg

Proposed elevation

NYguy

Sep 11, 2007, 12:15 PM

http://www.nypost.com/seven/09112007/news/regionalnews/a_door_able_subway.htm

A-DOOR-ABLE SUBWAY

By JEREMY OLSHAN
September 11, 2007

The extension of the No. 7 subway line will boast twice as many doors to stand clear of. Officials said that as part of the $2.1 billion project extending the line from Times Square to the Javits Center, the new station at 34th Street and 11th Avenue will feature platform-edge doors.

The glass doors will separate the platform from the tracks and line up with the doors of the trains.

Used on rail systems around the world, including the AirTrain at JFK Airport, they guard against passengers plunging off the platform and make it easier to control the climate in the station.

The station would be a test of the technology, which could one day be implemented on the planned Second Avenue line.

It likely would not be feasible or cost effective to install the doors along existing lines, officials said.

The No. 7 line extension is scheduled to be completed in 2013, roughly the same time as the first segment of the Second Avenue line.

Mr Man

Sep 16, 2007, 11:45 PM

I'm suprised and pleased with the huge amount of developments in New York: West Side Access, Second Avenue Subway, Downtown Brooklyn, and now the Hudson Yards.

dallasbrink

Oct 2, 2007, 10:48 PM

So since the jets are staying in the meadow lands, is this project still going forward?

NYguy

Oct 7, 2007, 12:15 AM

So since the jets are staying in the meadow lands, is this project still going forward?

This isn't a JETS development.

NYguy

Nov 5, 2007, 12:30 PM

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/2007/11/05/2007-11-05_west_side_residents_vs_bloomberg_over_re-3.html

West Side residents vs. Bloomberg over rezoning plan

BY ADAM LISBERG
November 5th 2007

Bloomberg has called the West Side "the next Gold Coast" - but critics wonder why the anti-congestion mayor wants to pack it with as many as 20,000 more parking spaces.

Local residents are suing to block Bloomberg's rezoning plan for the area because of the extra parking, and environmental and transportation groups also call it bad policy.

"It sounds to me like the development people are not talking to the environmental people at City Hall," said Assemblyman Richard Gottfried (D-Manhattan), who represents the area. "It would encourage more people to drive cars into the central business district. If you build off-street parking, they will come."

Bloomberg this spring unveiled a long-term strategy to keep New York from choking on traffic by charging cars $8 to enter Manhattan below 86th St. But he has also pushed an effort to rezone the far West Side region known as Hudson Yards for new high-rises - and garages.

Most of Manhattan is covered by tight parking restrictions to discourage cars and reduce air pollution, but the Hudson Yards rezoning sought to lift those limits to allow an extra 20,000 parking spaces, said Kyle Wiswall, general counsel for the Tri-State Transportation Campaign.

"It seems kind of quizzical why they're still pursuing more parking there," Wiswall told the Daily News. "The last thing it needs is more traffic."

The Bloomberg administration says it hopes most workers and residents will rely on mass transit to get there.

"The recent rezoning of Hudson Yards, which was done concurrently with the approval of the expansion of the No. 7 subway, will promote the emergence of a new public-transportation-oriented residential and commercial community with considerable affordable housing and public green space," said mayoral spokesman John Gallagher.

In a speech to the Manhattan Institute last week, Bloomberg said extending the 7 train to Hudson yards will make it "the next Gold Coast of this city."

Gottfried, though, said more parking will create more congestion. "If increased development is going to be accompanied by increased automobile traffic, it will strangle itself," he said.

State environmental regulators had not objected to the rezoning until critics complained in August. Now state Environmental Conservation Commissioner Pete Grannis has ordered the city to study how parking limits affect air pollution.

"We've been at hearing after hearing," said Christine Berthet of the Hell's Kitchen Neighborhood Association, which has sued to block the rezoning. "Why is the plan still there?"

Chicago2020

Nov 5, 2007, 6:56 PM

That first rendering on page one is absolutly...WOW WOW

NYGUY, what was the city's reaction towards the first proposal with the Jets Stadium???

NYguy

Nov 6, 2007, 11:36 PM

NYGUY, what was the city's reaction towards the first proposal with the Jets Stadium???

The city was behind the push for the proposed Jets Stadium. It was already approved,with contributions of $300 million from both the city and state to help pay for the $2 billion stadium. However, the state's contribution of $300 million was blocked, leading the Jets (who were already planning to spend wll over $1 billion) to find a less costly alternative by partnering with the Giants in the meadowlands.

Picking up the pieces from that, the MTA has now put the railyards out to bid again, which 5 bids have been received for.

NYguy

Mar 26, 2008, 4:19 PM

http://www.nypost.com/seven/03242008/news/regionalnews/citys_yards_work_103244.htm

CITY'S YARDS-WORK
PLAN FOR NEW PARK REVEALED

http://www.nypost.com/seven/03242008/photos/new0A.jpg

PARK-ING PLACE:The city's Hudson Yards project includes a pedestrian bridge

http://www.nypost.com/seven/03242008/photos/new0B.jpg

a park with a playground

By TOM TOPOUSIS
March 24, 2008

The city's long-sought plan to transform the Far West Side into a new commercial and residential district takes a step forward today, with the launch of a search for firms interested in designing a park and boulevard at the heart of the project.

The boulevard and park are key parts of the Hudson Yards plan proposed by the Bloomberg administration, which has detailed what it would like to see built in newly released sketches.

The boulevard and park will run north-south between 10th and 11th avenues, eventually stretching from 33rd Street to 39th Street.

"As the city grows it becomes increasingly difficult to create significant new open space. However, this park and boulevard will provide dynamic new green space for residents, workers and visitors in the Hudson Yards neighborhood, an area that is woefully lacking in open space today," said Ann Weisbrod, president of the Hudson Yards Development Corp.

A master plan calls for an estimated 24 million square feet of new office space - more than double what's being planned at the World Trade Center - to be built in the district by 2032.

The first phase, from 33rd to 36th Street is expected to be complete in 2012. The city has acquired all of the buildings in that three-block section of the boulevard's path.

Plans call for a 30-foot-wide, tree-lined boulevard and a four-acre park.

Funding for the project is coming out of the $3 billion in bonds the city is selling to pay for an extension of the No. 7 subway line to 11th Avenue and 34th Street.

NYguy

Sep 23, 2008, 12:15 PM

Redevelopment of Manhattan's far west side begins to take shape...
http://www.nypost.com/seven/09222008/news/regionalnews/citys_spectacular_new_w__side_story_130215.htm

CITY'S SPECTACULAR NEW W. SIDE STORY

http://www.nypost.com/seven/09222008/photos/new0j.jpg
BIG IDEAS: Proposals for the new West Side boulevard include Work Architecture's fanciful hills

By TOM TOPOUSIS
September 22, 2008

Here's the first look at designs for a spectacular new boulevard and park planned for Manhattan's far West Side, where Mayor Bloomberg wants to build a new business district more than twice the size of the World Trade Center complex.

From fanciful images of hills, trails and plantings to a park filled with enormous evergreen trees and rock outcrops, the proposals from five teams of architects vying to design the park and boulevard will go before the public beginning today.

The project, part of the Hudson Yards redevelopment, will create four acres of park space down the middle of a boulevard stretching from 33rd to 42nd Streets, between 10th and 11th Avenues, and linking up with a massive new office and residential project planned for the West Side rail yard just to the south of the new avenue.

"We are thrilled by the quality of the designs," said Ann Weisbrod, president of the Hudson Yards Development Corp., which is overseeing construction of the project and the financing of an extension of the No. 7 subway line to a new station at 11th Avenue and 34th Street.

The winning design will be selected in early October, Weisbrod said. Construction of the first phase of the project, from 33rd to 36th streets, is expected be completed at the same time as the subway extension in 2013.

The now low-rise neighborhood was rezoned by the City Council several years ago to allow for up to 24 million square feet of office space and 13,500 new units of housing, along with hotels and retail development.

The entire project - construction of the subway, boulevard, plaza and other infrastructure work - is being paid for with $3 billion in bonds.

"This is the extension of Midtown, the preeminent business district in the world," said Weisbrod.

The designs will be on public display at the Center for Architecture, at 536 La Guardia Place, from Sept. 25 through the end of October.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/09222008/photos/new0k.jpg

Hargreaves Associates' curled overpass .

http://www.nypost.com/photos/galleries/news/regionalnews/pp_20080922_w_side/photo02.jpg

Gustafson Team: Gustafson Guthrie Nichol Ltd/Allied Works Architecture Inc/PB Americas Inc.

http://www.nypost.com/photos/galleries/news/regionalnews/pp_20080922_w_side/photo03.jpg

Hargreaves Team: Hargreaves Associates, Ten Arquitectos, James Carpenter Design

http://www.nypost.com/photos/galleries/news/regionalnews/pp_20080922_w_side/photo04.jpg

Michael Van Valkenburgh Team: Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Inc., Landscape Architects

http://www.nypost.com/photos/galleries/news/regionalnews/pp_20080922_w_side/photo05.jpg

West Infinity Team: West Infinity

______________________________________

New boulevard and park location:

http://www.hydc.org/includes/site_images/misc/home_map_large.gif

NYguy

Oct 16, 2008, 4:02 PM

http://archrecord.construction.com/news/daily/archives/081008hudsonpark.asp

Five Designs for Hudson Park Revealed

October 8, 2008
By Tim McKeough

Five teams competing to design a new park for Manhattan’s West Side recently unveiled their proposals. Led by the Hudson Yards Development Corporation, the Hudson Park and Boulevard project will cover 4 acres stretching from West 33rd to West 42nd Street, between 10th and 11th Avenues—an area presently occupied by a hodgepodge of buildings, rail lines, and roads leading to the Lincoln Tunnel. To the south, the park would connect to the Hudson Rail Yards, a 26-acre mixed-use development that calls for office towers, residential buildings, stores, and parks to be built on a massive platform over existing train tracks. Both projects are part of an initiative to transform an uninviting, semi-industrial area into a popular live-work-play destination.

A selection committee, whose members come from the Hudson Yards Development Corporation and numerous city departments,
plans to announce a winner in late October, and Phase 1 of the project, running between West 33rd and West 36th Streets, is expected to be completed by 2013. The proposals are on view at New York’s Center for Architecture, 536 LaGuardia Place, through the end of October.

http://archrecord.construction.com/news/daily/archives/081008hudsonpark/2.jpg

A team led by Work Architecture Company and Balmori Associates envisions a “Wild West Side,” where “Times Square meets Central Park,” says Work principal Dan Wood, AIA. The plan calls for undulating, grassy hills with space for cafes and other facilities underneath. Other features include urban gardens, a new animal habitat, and water collection systems that double as park furniture.

http://archrecord.construction.com/news/daily/archives/081008hudsonpark/4.jpg

A proposal from West 8, Mathews Nielsen, and Weisz + Yoes envisions a “primordial landscape,” with hills being constructed using schist excavated at nearby construction sites, says West 8 principal Jerry van Eyck. Features include a skateboard park, an art park, and a children’s activity area, as well as a kinked bridge that would bring pedestrians above roads leading to the Lincoln Tunnel and deliver them to West 42nd Street.

http://archrecord.construction.com/news/daily/archives/081008hudsonpark/5.jpg

http://archrecord.construction.com/news/daily/archives/081008hudsonpark/6.jpg

A team led by Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates and Toshiko Mori took inspiration from Manhattan’s Union Square but rearranged the formal plan “into a kind of carpet,” explains MVVA principal Matthew Urbanski. Benches, plantings, and paved circulation routes similar to those in Union Square would be arranged in a more freeform scheme. Overhead lighting strung between buildings would illuminate the park, and an S-curve bridge with curled edges would bypass tunnel traffic.

http://archrecord.construction.com/news/daily/archives/081008hudsonpark/7.jpg

http://archrecord.construction.com/news/daily/archives/081008hudsonpark/8.jpg

A plan from Hargreaves Associates and TEN Arquitectos calls for “ecological rooms,” from chestnut tree forests to pine barrens, describes Hargreaves principal Ken Haines. James Carpenter-designed light wands installed throughout the park would capture and redistribute sunlight. The scheme’s signature feature is a pedestrian bridge edged by a ribbon of grass that curls like a rollercoaster loop over the walkway.

NYguy

Nov 3, 2008, 11:28 PM

http://www.observer.com/2008/real-estate/related-cos-west-side-rail-yards-deal-faces-delay

Related's West Side Rail Yards Deal Faces Delay

http://www.observer.com/files/imagecache/vertical/files/related_HY_aerial_west.jpg

by Eliot Brown
November 3, 2008

The deal to put $15 billion in residential and commercial development atop the M.T.A.'s West Side rail yards has hit a delay, as the agency will not sign a contract with developer Related Companies this week, as was originally scheduled. The state authority says it has reached an agreement with Related (which is in a joint venture with Goldman Sachs) to push back the deadline for signing a contract for the property by another 90 days, as the M.T.A. has been slower than expected in producing the needed paperwork.

"We have together agreed on an extension of the designation period," said Gary Dellaverson, the CFO of the M.T.A. (who has to have one of the least enviable jobs in government these days). "Our expectation was that the documents would have been turned a month and a half ago.

"This is my fault—the fault of the M.T.A.," he said. "This is not a product of either Related or Goldman or their lawyers."

The M.T.A. named Related the conditionally designated developer back in May, when Related beat out other developers, offering to pay over $1 billion for the rights to develop the 26-acre West Side site. At the time, the agency gave itself and Related 165 days to sign a contract, according to details of the agreement provided to the M.T.A. board at the time, a window that would have expired today. But the agency has been slow to create the contract, a fact it says is due in part to the collapse of the credit markets. The M.T.A.'s attorneys for the deal, Paul, Weiss, have had much work related to the financial crisis and have been slower than expected in finishing their work, Mr. Dellaverson said. As a result, the first draft of the contract and other documents have not yet been provided to Related.

The contract is an important, but not final, step in the solidification of the deal with Related, which would need to be closed some months after going to contract. The M.T.A. originally envisioned closing on the eastern half of the rail yards four months after signing the contract, while a closing on the western half would wait until after it has gone through the rezoning process, an approval targeted to come in late 2009.

The M.T.A. first selected Tishman Speyer to develop the yards in March, though the deal fell apart a month later when the firm tried to change the deal's terms. While the negotiations over the contract have yet to occur, Mr. Dellaverson said he is not worried that the financial crisis will push Related to back out of the agreement.

"I don't have any indication, and they haven't brought anything to me that would indicate slowness or desire to delay on their part," he said. "Everything that I've seen, is they're continuing to operate in good faith and pursuant to a desire to consummate the transaction."

NYC4Life

Nov 4, 2008, 3:31 AM

This thread should be moved to either the Supertall / skyscraper proposals thread, or should be split between the skyscraper portion and the parkland / open space portion.

NYguy

Nov 4, 2008, 1:01 PM

This thread should be moved to either the Supertall / skyscraper proposals thread, or should be split between the skyscraper portion and the parkland / open space portion.

This is the Hudson Yards redevelopment thread. We did have a railyard thread, but that one was lost. This thread encompasses everything Hudson Yards related, from the boulevard, the parks, the convention center, the railyards as well.

NYguy

Nov 4, 2008, 1:04 PM

A summary of the redevelopment.

HUDSON YARDS
http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/html/hyards/eis.shtml

ZONING
http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/hyards/hy_zoning_012005.pdf

DESCRIPTION
http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/hyards/hy_chap2_t_fgeis_final.pdf

SUMMARY
http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/hyards/hy_development_information.pdf

NYguy

Dec 1, 2008, 10:23 PM

An update on the eastern railyards will be presented tonight...
http://www.thehighline.org/newsletters/112408.html

http://www.thehighline.org/img/newsletter/111408_v2/postcard.jpg

Show your support for the High Line at this public forum hosted by Manhattan Community Board 4 and the Hudson Yards Community Advisory Committee.

The Related Companies, the developer for the site, will present its revised plan for the Eastern Rail Yards, which includes a significant portion of the High Line, including the 10th Avenue Spur. The developer is requesting amendments to the underlying zoning for the site, which will require public review and approval by the City Council.

The proposed zoning amendments do not address preservation of the High Line. In fact, the High Line is not even officially on the agenda for the December 1 presentation. Which is why we need your support NOW.

This is our one chance in the public review process for the Eastern Rail Yards to speak out for full preservation of the High Line, including the 10th Avenue Spur.

From the beginning of the rail yards planning process, the public has been calling for preservation of the High Line, but the High Line is still not protected and remains at risk of demolition. This is our chance to let the City, Governor Paterson, the MTA, and the developers know that it is not acceptable to let the fate of the High Line continue to hang in the balance, and that preservation of the High Line needs to be guaranteed now.

Come to the December 1 public forum and let your voice be heard.
**Free Save the Spur t-shirts and buttons for all supporters who attend.**

Monday, December 1, 2008
6:30 - 8:30 PM (doors open at 6:00)
Red Cross, 520 West 49th Street
Rooms A and B

http://www.thehighline.org/img/newsletter/112408/tshirt.jpg

NYguy

Dec 3, 2008, 1:31 AM

http://www.observer.com/2008/real-estate/city-probably-taps-van-valkenburgh-west-side-park

City (Probably) Taps Van Valkenburgh for West Side Park

http://www.observer.com/files/imagecache/article/files/van%20valkenburgh.JPG

by Eliot Brown
December 2, 2008

It seems the Bloomberg administration has chosen landscape designer Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates to build a new West Side park, though there’s no official word yet from the city.

Last night at a forum on the West Side rail yards, both Vishaan Chakrabarti, an executive at the Related Companies who is leading the firm’s development of the yards, and Assemblyman Dick Gottfried referred to Van Valkenburgh as the winner of a design competition for a mid-block park and boulevard. The park is planned to run between 10th and 11th avenues, from 33rd Street to 42nd Street (though only the first segment, from 33rd Street to 36th Street, is funded).

The city’s Hudson Yards Development Corporation declined to comment.

Assuming the news is true (we’d also heard chatter of the same news before last night), the selection of Van Valkenburgh would presumably connect well with Related’s planned $15 billion West Side rail yards development as it is also the landscape architect there.

Michael Van Valkenburgh is doing quite a bit of business these days in the city. The firm does work on Hudson River Park; it’s designing Brooklyn Bridge Park; and it planned the redesign of the northern end of Union Square Park, currently under construction.

Last night's forum, nominally devoted to zoning text amendments for the eastern half of the rail yards, focused mainly on Related’s potential move to tear down a “spur” off the High Line, the railway viaduct-turned-parkland that runs through the rail yards. The spur runs east from the High Line along 30th Street, crossing 10th Avenue.

Most of the dozens of attendees indicated they supported saving the spur, as did two elected officials in attendance, Representative Jerry Nadler and Assemblyman Dick Gottfried. Related has indicated it is concerned about the size and potential economic impact of the structure. The founders of the High Line effort, Friends of the High Line, are pushing Related hard to retain the spur and to move two planned buildings on the western edge of the site away from the High Line (Related revealed images last night showing that one of those buildings had been moved.)

NYguy

Dec 8, 2008, 11:17 PM

http://ny.therealdeal.com/articles/demo-contracts-near-for-hudson-yards-park

Demo contracts near for Hudson Yards park

http://s3.amazonaws.com/trd_three/images/59120/545_articlebox.jpg

545 West 34th Street

By Adam Pincus
12/08/08

The city is moving forward with demolition to clear the way for a new four-acre park and boulevard as well as the entrance for the new terminal station for the No. 7 train for the massive Hudson Yards redevelopment project on Manhattan's West Side.

The city is expected to award its first contracts this week to raze two buildings on two large parcels spanning from 34th to 36th streets, and 10th to 11th avenues, which will become part of the new Hudson Boulevard and park.

And a block to the south, the city is seeking bids that are due Friday for the demolition of the former FedEx World Service Center building at 528-556 West 34th Street, to make way for the entrance to the No. 7 train on 33rd Street.

The buildings will be brought down in what many fear will be the worst economic recession in decades, leading critics to wonder who is going to build and occupy the massive skyscrapers envisioned for the Hudson Yards district or whether the structures will come down but nothing will rise in their places, a waste of functional buildings.

Hudson Boulevard and the park comprise a mid-block open space that is planned to run from 33rd to 39th streets between 10th and 11th avenues, and be lined with large office and residential towers. The first phase of the park and boulevard, from 33rd to 36th streets, is slated to be completed in 2013. A design team is expected to be named in the next several weeks, city officials said.

The city-led Hudson Yards Development Corporation is overseeing the long-term project to redevelop the West Side.

The two large parcels that will make up the park and boulevard are now mostly occupied by buildings but also include vacant land.

The three buildings that are coming down are a six-story, red brick residential building at 545 West 34th Street, and a seven-story commercial building at 524-542 West 36th Street, both between 10th and 11th avenues, in addition to the FedEx building.

Joe Restuccia, executive director of the West Side advocacy group Clinton Housing Development Company, which helped tenants from 545 West 34th Street find new apartments, said the weak private development market would likely assure that the land remained empty for years.

"Do you believe there is a speculative office building that will be built on the West Side?" he said. "My real concern is the land will be vacant for quite some time and there won't be any improvement in the area."

David Farber, vice president and general counsel at the Hudson Yards Development Corporation, wrote in an email: "The park and boulevard remain on schedule to be completed in 2013, and therefore we must go ahead with that demolition work."

Five demolition bids have been received for the two park and boulevard parcels, which are expected to cost approximately $6 million to $8.5 million each, said a spokesperson for the city's Department of Housing Preservation and Development, which is handling the demolition contracts.

The bids were closed October 24 and the city had 45 days to select a contractor, the HPD spokesperson said. The city may choose a contractor after the 45-day period, but the winning company is no longer bound by its bid.

Lecom

Dec 9, 2008, 4:19 AM

"This is my fault—the fault of the M.T.A.," he said. "This is not a product of either Related or Goldman or their lawyers."
Hot damn, a politician owing up to his missteps. That's a rarity.

NYguy

Dec 9, 2008, 12:46 PM

Meanwhile, Related continues to work on the railyard master plan...
http://www.chelseanow.com/cn_115/highlinesupporter.html

High Line supporters ‘spur’ developer to save section

http://www.chelseanow.com/cn_115/high.jpg

Vishaan Chakrabarti (at microphone), Related’s executive vice president of design and planning, and Jay Cross, president of Related Hudson Yards, address the crowd.

By Heather Murray
December 5-11, 2008

High Line supporters flooded a public meeting on Monday wearing matching red T-shirts and waving signs to lobby developers of the Hudson Yards to preserve the northern portion of the former elevated railway.

The meeting, held by Community Board 4 with the development team of The Related Companies/Goldman Sachs, intended to cover the developer’s request for a zoning amendment to add a building and limit on-site parking at the eastern portion of the rail yards. Instead, Related spent most of the evening rebuffing attempts from High Line advocates to obtain a clear commitment from the developer to protect the High Line’s 10th Ave. “spur,” where it abuts the yards along W. 30th St.

Supporters filled the Red Cross conference room on W. 49th St. donning “Save the Spur” shirts handed out by Friends of the High Line and holding signs reading “Spur of the Moment” to draw attention to the section, which represents a third of the entire High Line structure. The spur is located where the developer plans to build commercial buildings and an urban plaza, and discussions between the Friends and Related about the fate of the section have been ongoing since the developer was chosen this spring.

Several minutes before the meeting began, attendees filled every chair and the audience snaked around the back and sides of the room. FHL cofounder Robert Hammond, the first to sign up on the public comment sheet to speak, asked how many people in the room were High Line supporters—with more than three-quarters of the audience shooting up their hands.

“Ten, 20, 30, 100 years from now, no one is going to remember these discussions about the spur. It’s either going to be there or it’s not going to be there, and that’s all that really matters,” he said. “I think the city wants to be on the right side of history, and I think we have that opportunity … The High Line is going to be the only piece of history that’s visible on the site. It’s what will give this new development soul. Hopefully.”

Hammond added that he is still concerned about future buildings blocking the 30th Street view corridor on the Western Rail Yard.

Frank Sanchez, senior vice president of the Municipal Art Society of New York, said that the spur illustrates how the High Line weaves through the city and ultimately connects to the rail yards. “It’s not intelligible unless the entire High Line is preserved,” he noted, wondering “why we have to keep coming back at hearing after hearing to defend something that has proved itself so much.”

Congressmember Jerrold Nadler also came to the meeting to advocate for the High Line as a longtime supporter of the structure. He filed a lawsuit back in the 1980s along with other elected officials to keep the city from tearing it down. He commented that the High Line enhances property values located near the “very valuable and unique open space.”

“Why anyone would even think of tearing down the spur is frankly beyond me,” he added. Nadler then asked that the public be given assurance that the entire High Line be preserved. “We shouldn’t have to re-fight the battle we fought 10 or 15 years ago.”

He also supports the reduction in parking spaces and Related’s reintroduction of the street grid to the site.

Several residents also questioned the developer’s reasons for not committing to saving the spur. Related’s executive vice president of design and planning, Vishaan Chakrabarti, who is also a board member of the Friends of the High Line, reiterated that Related has made “no decision about the spur.”

“Many of us truly believe in the High Line,” he said. “The spur is very unique. It has a very specific location vis-à-vis our site. I think those discussions with Friends of the High Line have been very productive. We need to work together to solve the problem.”

Board 4 chairperson JD Noland had earlier kicked off the forum on a more humorous note. “Goldman Sachs wants to put a farm down there and raise corn and soybeans, so they will get at least some return on their investment,” he quipped, while the community would be delighted with “six-story brick buildings with 90 percent permanent affordable housing and each apartment to have a view of the High Line.”

Obviously, Related has different plans for the site, located roughly where Chelsea meets Hell’s Kitchen between 10th and 11th Aves. and 30th and 33rd Sts. The concept the developer presented had mostly been set in stone in the 2005 rezoning of the Eastern Rail Yard, where Related plans to build primarily office and retail buildings on roughly 6.27 million zoning square feet, including three residential buildings, several acres of open space, cultural and parking facilities.

“There’s a limited number of things we can persuasively comment on,” said Hudson Yards Community Advisory Committee chairperson Anna Hayes Levin, who is also a Board 4 member, adding that has never before stopped the community from letting its views be known.

Levin said that the City Planning Commission would put the minor zoning changes Related is seeking out for public comment later this week, one of which seeks to lower the number of required parking spaces on-site—a move that many community members said they endorsed wholeheartedly.

The zoning currently requires a minimum of 2,000 parking spaces, and Jay Cross, president of Related Hudson Yards, said the developer is seeking to have that minimum removed entirely. Related does plan to have on-site parking, but would prefer to have a maximum of 1,000 spaces, 350 of which would be designated for commercial purposes. Cross said his team hopes to remove the potential for public parking at Hudson Yards, allowing only parking that is linked to residential and commercial uses.

The other change Related hopes the city will approve is to allow a building to go up on the southwest corner of the site at 30th St. and 11th Ave., adjacent to the proposed cultural facility, which Cross said would decrease the size of the facility.

Chakrabarti stressed that, “While we’re permitting a building where before there wasn’t a building, we haven’t increased the density in any way.”

Assemblymember Richard Gottfried offered four proposals for the developer to consider, suggesting first that a school be incorporated into the cultural facility. “It could be themed to take advantage of that co-location,” he said. A 120,000-square-foot elementary/middle school is already proposed for the western portion of the rail yard, but it would likely seat only about 800 students, and Gottfried felt “the current plan should be expanded and come online sooner.”

He also advocated for the spur’s survival, saying removal of the spur is unnecessary, would violate New York’s commitment to maximizing the revitalization of the High Line, and simply “is not acceptable.”

“It is hard to fathom why in the last six months there has not been a solution to this problem, as other issues have been resolved,” Gottfried said. “This can and must be worked out.” He also requested that Related pay special attention to open space and sustainability, and work to reduce traffic flowing into and out of the site.

Several residents asked for more details on the residential housing planned for the eastern portion. Chakrabarti responded that 1.7 million square feet of residential housing would be built, the maximum allowed in the current zoning, which works out to roughly 1,700 units. Related plans to make 20 percent of the rental units affordable, but hasn’t determined how many rental units will be included in the project.

Chakrabarti noted that out of the three residential buildings, it is “reasonable to assume one will be rental, but we haven’t made a determination yet.”

Christine Berthet, co-chairperson of CB 4’s Transportation Planning Committee, said that she hoped Related would commit to reduce parking even further than stated in its proposed text amendment. She noted that even in the richest areas of Manhattan, the highest level of ownership for cars is 31 percent. Lower-income people are much less likely to own cars, she stated, and pointed out that Related’s proposed number of parking spaces would still provide roughly 35 percent of potential residential units with a parking spot. “The average should be more around 25 percent,” Berthet added, noting that the federal Clean Air Act “suggested that 20 percent would be good.” More money should be spent on transportation infrastructure like the No. 7 subway extension and less on parking, she said.

Board 4’s Clinton/Hell’s Kitchen Land Use Committee will discussRelated/Goldman Sachs’s proposed text amendments at its next monthly meeting, scheduled for Dec. 10 at 6:30 p.m. at John Jay College.

NYguy

Dec 13, 2008, 12:58 PM

http://www.chelseanow.com/cn_116/thebuzz.html

RAIL YARD MOVES

Representatives from The Related Companies’ Hudson Yards arm got the support they wanted from Community Board 4’s Clinton/Hell’s Kitchen Land Use Committee Wednesday night for two zoning changes the developer is seeking on the Eastern Rail Yard.

The first text amendment would create a predominantly residential building on the southwest corner at the site, thereby reducing the size of the community facility proposed there. Committee chairperson Anna Hayes Levin said the amendment gives the community two great benefits: It reduces the height of all on-site buildings and adds a residential element at that corner.

The second amendment would remove the zoning requirement for 2,000 on-site parking spaces, replacing it with a maximum of 1,000 spaces—350 of which would be for commercial use.

photoLith

Dec 13, 2008, 11:04 PM

Im not a big fan of all that green space in the renders. Tons of green space like that makes it feel suburban which sucks.

NYC4Life

Dec 16, 2008, 11:09 AM

More green, more NIMBYs rejoycing.

NYguy

Dec 16, 2008, 2:46 PM

Im not a big fan of all that green space in the renders. Tons of green space like that makes it feel suburban which sucks.

It won't feel like that at all because it's in Manhattan, which has great public (and urban) green spaces (Bryant Park, Madison Square Park, Union Square Park, etc.). There's nothing quite like that in that area. And there's something about New York's parks that let's you know you're still in the city.

NYguy

Jan 21, 2009, 1:37 PM

http://www.observer.com/2009/real-estate/deal-or-no-deal-time-west-side-yards

Deal or No Deal Time on West Side Yards
Related confronts different financing climate than when it inked deal with M.T.A. in ’08; time frame faces tweaks

by Eliot Brown
January 20, 2009

Stephen Ross confronts a wildly different world than when his Related Companies was designated as the winning bidder for the 26-acre West Side rail yards last May, earning the opportunity to transform the far West Side with $15 billion in office and residential development.

Mr. Ross now faces his first major test on the project since the economy imploded last September, as the end of this month brings a key deadline with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the yards’ owner. Related is supposed to enter into a contract with the agency, plunking down about $50 million in an initial deposit and fees, and officially starting the clock for plenty more payments to come (the entire deal involves paying about $1 billion to the M.T.A.).

Related, for its part, has said it is committed to the project and clearly views it as a long-term investment. But as the deadline for the contract approaches, there are signs of trouble amid the global financing drought, suggesting the deal between the M.T.A. and the developer might not work out quite as swimmingly as imagined, or perhaps not in the initial time frame envisioned.

Related has recently expressed worries about financing to numerous real estate executives and others familiar with the project, saying that the company has had trouble raising new money, according to those people.

Although such credit problems are hardly unique, Related, not known for doing much on a shoestring budget, has also cut back its payments to contractors. The firm stopped paying its architects, according to people familiar with the developer. And just as the public review is beginning for zoning changes integral to the project, Related has cut by half the amount it is paying its lobbying firm Capalino + Company, according to lobbying records. The lobbying firm specializes in guiding projects through the public review process.

Statements from the two parties were hardly brimming with optimism.

“Discussions with Related are at a sensitive point, so we will not be commenting substantively on them,” said M.T.A. spokesman Jeremy Soffin.

A Related spokeswoman, Joanna Rose, said that the project “continues to move forward.”

“We remain focused on the various governmental and required reviews that continue to progress,” she said.

Based on the terms of the deal struck in the less inclement climate of May 2008, Related would seem to benefit from putting off any contract execution, as it would acquire more time to observe the economy’s effects on office rents and apartment prices. The developer is also better positioned to negotiate concessions now than it was back in May, when other bidders were vying as well; and the agency would presumably be reticent to just break off the deal with Related if the developer wants any changes, as it did when the initial winner, Tishman Speyer, tried to change the terms of its initially victorious bid last spring.

Related must start paying rent three years after it closes on the deal—M.T.A. documents issued to bidders last year set the timing of the deal’s closure at three months after the contract is signed—though it could push those payments off for an extra two years based on the terms of the initial agreement with the M.T.A., as construction could easily be put off due to a dearth of commercial tenants desiring new office buildings.

NYguy

Jan 23, 2009, 6:31 PM

http://ny.metro.us/metro/local/article/MTA_in_Rail_Yard_trouble/14883.html

MTA in Rail Yard trouble

by patrick arden / metro new york
JAN 23, 2009

The MTA is still counting on $1 billion from the sale of its West Side rail yards. But the centerpiece of the city’s Hudson Yards development plan now faces an uncertain future, just nine days before a contract deadline.

“Very sensitive” is how MTA CEO Elliot Sander described negotiations with the Related Companies on Wednesday. Related is supposed to put down a $50 million deposit next week, at a time when banks have grown increasingly tightfisted.

Related’s Stephen Ross, chair of the Real Estate Board of New York, was lobbying lawmakers last month in Washington, D.C. REBNY President Steven Spinola said developers want help from the $350 billion remaining in financial-industry bailout funds to refinance their loans.

“If [new] loans are not available, it could have an even more devastating impact on the nation's economy than the mortgage crisis,” Spinola said.

This week Ross completed his purchase of the Miami Dolphins, leading one Florida newspaper columnist to marvel, “What a country we have, where Ross can ask for hundreds of millions in welfare with one hand and plan to buy a $1.1 billion football toy with the other.”

A Related spokeswoman said Ross isn’t involved in the bailout effort and the Hudson Yards “continues to move forward.” In 2006, the city backed $2 billion in bonds to extend the 7 line to the Hudson Yards. Former Deputy Mayor Daniel Doctoroff called it “the best investment in our future.”

NYguy

Feb 2, 2009, 11:36 PM

http://www.crainsnewyork.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090131/FREE/901319967

Talks to continue on Hudson Yards contract
MTA spokesman says negotiations with Related Companies are "constructive" over multibillion-dollar West Side project.

January 31, 2009

(AP) - The Metropolitan Transportation Authority and a developer will keep negotiating past a deadline for reaching a contract to overhaul a swath of rail yards on the Hudson River in Manhattan, an MTA spokesman said Saturday.

The transit agency and Related Cos. had set a Saturday deadline for a deal on the 26-acre, multibillion-dollar Hudson Yards project. It is considered one of the best development opportunities left in the city, but it comes as the credit crisis is hitting commercial real estate hard, leaving many developers without financing sources.

MTA spokesman Jeremy Soffin said the agency and company had "constructive negotiations" Saturday and agreed to continue talking Monday. A Related spokeswoman did not immediately respond to an e-mail message Saturday.

The Hudson Yards project is paired with a subway line extension that aims to create a media-based, western Midtown Manhattan district. Related, which is partnered with investment bank Goldman Sachs, has proposed 5.3 million square feet of apartments, 5.5 million square feet of office space, shops, hotels and a public school.

The company was chosen for the project in May, after developer Tishman Speyer Properties dropped out of the deal over price. Related bid just over $1 billion and will pay at least $2 billion more to build platforms over the rail yards.

The developer and the MTA extended a November deadline to close the deal by 90 days. Related would need to make a $50 million payment at closing.

NYguy

Feb 3, 2009, 1:22 PM

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/03/nyregion/03yards.html?ref=nyregion

M.T.A. and Developer Agree to Delay $1 Billion Railyard Deal

By CHARLES V. BAGLI
February 2, 2009

Last year, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority struck a deal to sell the development rights for a 26-acre complex of office towers and apartment buildings on the West Side of Manhattan for $1 billion, much needed revenue for new trains, track repairs and the expansion of the public transit system.

But with a severely ailing economy and a lack of financing for real estate projects, the developer, the Related Companies, have reached an agreement with the transportation authority to delay closing on the project for a year. As a result, Related will not have to make a $43.5 million down payment immediately, although the company will have to pay a nonrefundable $10 million for the delay, according to two executives who have been briefed on the agreement.

Related is expected to sign a letter on Tuesday extending its designation as the developer for the site, which sits on both sides of 11th Avenue between 30th and 33rd Streets. The agreement needs the approval of the authority’s directors.

Stephen M. Ross, chairman of the Related Companies, said the new agreement was necessary because of the recession and the frozen state of the credit markets, which has brought construction projects in the city to a halt.

But, Mr. Ross said in an interview Monday evening, he remained committed to both the project and to New York.

“I’m excited about the future of New York,” Mr. Ross said. “I believe it’ll come back even stronger than before. But right now we’re going through a financial crisis.”

Gary Dellaverson, chief financial officer for the authority, confirmed that he had reached “an understanding” with Related, but declined to discuss the details until Related signed the agreement and his board approved it on Tuesday.

Under the new agreement, Related would sign the contracts in a year, instead of now, according to the two executives. The developer would not have to begin making the down payment until then, and it would be staggered over another year. The developer would still pay $1 billion over time, but the money would not get to the authority as quickly.

The authority selected the Related Companies for the project last May after another bidder, Tishman Speyer Properties, dropped out. Related agreed to pay $1 billion over 99 years for the right to build 5.5 million square feet of commercial space, 5,500 apartments and a park over the West Side railyards.

But the ambitious project requires Related to spend about $2 billion to erect platforms, columns and foundations over a working railyard before it can build the first tower.

Mr. Ross, who closed last month on his $1.1 billion purchase of the Miami Dolphins football team, was supposed to sign the contracts for the West Side project by Jan. 31 and make a $43.5 million down payment. He was to close within 120 days on the eastern half of the project and at the end of 2009 on the western half. In recent weeks, the developer asked the authority to delay the closings and payments.

Related has told city and state officials that it has spent about $30 million on architects, engineers and fees so far. It is seeking to rezone the western portion of the property, a public process costing about $7 million.

The transportation authority, which is under enormous financial stress, was not eager to forgo the payments. It is considering steep increases in fares and bridge tolls, as well as service cuts, to bridge a $1.2 billion shortfall in its operating budget. And it has pared more than $2 billion from its capital budget.

But transportation officials ultimately agreed, saying they would not have been able to replace Related given the current economic climate.

Goldman Sachs, Related’s original partner, declined to comment on whether it was still in the deal.

Scruffy

Feb 11, 2009, 7:51 PM

1 Year!!

NYguy

Feb 19, 2009, 3:45 PM

http://rew-online.com/news/story.aspx?id=593

City may have to service Hudson Yards bonds for longer than originally anticipated

Daniel Geiger
2/17/2009

With development delayed in Hudson Yards, city will have to fund debt service on bonds for infrastructure in the meantime

The city will likely have to pay more debt service than originally anticipated for the $2 billion of Hudson Yards bonds that were issued in 2007 to finance the extension of the No. 7 subway line and other infrastructure projects on the far West Side.

According to documents released at the time of that bond offering by the Hudson Yards Infrastructure Corporation, the agency that manages the funds, the city calculated that deferred tax payments and other charges tied to projected development on the West Side would be enough to pay the roughly $100 million of yearly debt service on the bonds by 2014.

But with the economy in the midst of a serious recession, that development could take substantially longer to materialize than the city’s 2014 timeline appears to anticipate.

Last week, for instance, the Related Companies, a Manhattan based real estate firm, negotiated a yearlong extension with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority on having to place a roughly $43 million payment to secure development rights for the West Side rail yards, where Related has planned to eventually build a $15 billion complex of office, residential and retail buildings. In a release issued to announce the extension, the MTA cited the economic downturn and the “collapse of traditional commercial lending” as reasons for the delay.

But the rail yards isn’t the only super-project that has come under a cloud of increased uncertainty within the Hudson Yards district, a swath of land in the West 30s and 40s that city planners have envisioned transforming into an extension of midtown. The development of Moynihan Station, which would expand and revamp Penn Station while creating opportunities for large office towers and retail development in the direct vicinity of the transit complex, has stalled for lack of funds and issues surrounding its complexity.

In the face of economic headwinds and without the two large developments buttressing the area’s revitalization, smaller scale development such as residential construction that had begun to take off in the district during the real estate boom has also appeared to falter more recently.

According to Nick Samuels, a vice president at Moody’s Investors Service, which maintains ratings for the Hudson Yards bonds, proceeds from tax revenues and one-time charges in 2008 were $1.6 million and $6.9 million respectively. That’s a precipitous decline from 2007, when the city netted nearly $60 million in such payments, most of which appear to have been one-time charges because of the paltry payments in lieu of taxes in 2008, which, once established, become perennial payments.

Led by Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s championing of the area’s potential as vital expansion room during the prosperous years before the current crisis, city planners devised a plan to defer tax payments and the proceeds from the sale of additional development rights to fund an extension of the No. 7 Subway from its current terminus at Times Square to 34th Street and Eleventh Avenue.

The extension, along with other infrastructure improvements such as a long, tree lined boulevard stretching diagonally between Eleventh and Tenth Avenues, have been viewed as pivotal to attracting residents, tenants and new development to the area.

The city anticipated that it could take years for the area’s makeover to get started and so agreed to fund whatever portion of the bonds’ debt service was left unpaid in the event the area’s development proceeds proved insufficient. Despite the risks, the city’s method appeared to be an innovative way of harnessing the economic potential of the far West Side to fund its own transformation rather than burdening the city’s general budget with having to make the large capital outlays.

But if the economic downturn pushes development in the district years behind original projections and the city has to pick up the tab for the $97 million in yearly interest to service the bonds for an extended period, it could begin to lend credibility to early questions over the wisdom over the city’s decision to use the complex financing plan over a more conventional structure.

One issue is that the Hudson Yards bonds receive a higher interest rate than if the city had issued the bonds directly because the Hudson Yards Infrastructure Corporation, even though it is backed by the city, has a slightly lower credit rating.

Another critique has focused on the city’s decision to discount tax payments in the Hudson Yards in order to spur development there, an incentive that some fiscal experts say will do little to encourage building in the area and only hamper the city’s efforts to generate enough cash flow when development does occur.

“I thought it was illusory that this was paying for itself,” said James Parrot, an economist for the fiscal watchdog group the Fiscal Policy Institute. “We criticized it on the grounds that the financing mechanism was making it harder to pay off the debt than if the city just put it in its capital plan and charged full property taxes.”

NYguy

Apr 2, 2009, 3:49 PM

Quote from an article in the Observer...
http://www.observer.com/2009/real-estate/activists-pressure-pols-northern-turn-high-line-its-relateds-rail-yards

Activists Pressure Pols on Northern Turn of the High Line; It's in Related's Rail Yards

By Reid Pillifant
April 2, 2009

The northern section was not transferred to the Parks Department in 2005, along with the rest of the line, because, at the time, the M.T.A. and the city were still unsure of their plans for the rail yards. The line’s current owner, CSX, appears willing to donate the remaining section of the High Line to the city at no cost, just as did with the preceding sections, but the city has yet to take up the offer.

The yards’ developer, the Related Companies, says it has included the High Line in its plans, and that it remains committed to preserving the northern spur as a public park. But Mr. Hammond would like to see the city take possession regardless as part of the land-use review process for the yards slated to start this summer. Related did not respond to requests for comment.

“It would just make us feel more comfortable for the city to be in control, and for the ultimate decision about the High Line to rest with the city, and not with a developer,” Mr. Hammond said after the meeting.

The city appears unwilling, at least for now, to publicly force Related into accepting the park. The High Line is just one of myriad issues to be settled in the re-zoning process of the western half of the rail yards, and some suspect Related would like to avoid a public guarantee in order to use the potential park as a bargaining chip for other deals, such as the amount of affordable housing or the inclusion of a school on the site.

NYguy

Apr 3, 2009, 3:44 PM

http://www.nypost.com/seven/04032009/news/regionalnews/council_ok_on_w__side_yards_162714.htm

COUNCIL OK ON W. SIDE YARDS

By TOM TOPOUSIS
April 3, 2009

Plans to build a $15 billion district of housing, parks and office towers over the West Side rail yards won a key approval from the City Council yesterday, even though construction of the project has been delayed by the economic downturn.

The council, by a 48-0 vote, approved several zoning changes for the eastern half of the site, which officials at The Related Companies said is a sign that the project is moving forward, even though construction is years off.

Related officials say they expect to begin work on rezoning the western half of the 26-acre site later this year.

NYguy

May 19, 2009, 12:40 AM

They've completed the DEIS for the western half of the railyards...
http://nyc.gov/html/dcp/html/env_review/western_rail_yard.shtml

Western Rail Yard Draft Environmental Impact Statement

On May 15th, 2009, the New York City Planning Commission and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, acting as co-lead agencies, issued a Notice of Completion for a Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) for the Western Rail Yard project.

A public hearing on the DEIS will be held at a later date to be announced, in conjunction with the City Planning Commission’s citywide public hearing pursuant to ULURP. Advance notice will be given of the time and place of the hearing. Written comments on the DEIS are requested and will be received and considered by the Lead Agency until the 10th calendar day following the close of the public hearing.

NYguy

May 19, 2009, 10:47 PM

http://www.observer.com/2009/real-estate/council-vote-related%E2%80%99s-rail-yards-plans-jan-1

Council Vote on Related’s Rail Yards Plans by Jan. 1

By Eliot Brown
May 19, 2009

If there was a race to get large development projects started in the city’s lengthy land-use review process, Stephen Ross and his Related Companies would be the clear winners.

On Monday, May 18, the Department of City Planning launched a long list of projects and initiatives into the seven-month-plus public approval process, two of them—the West Side rail yards and the Bronx’s Kingsbridge Armory—belonging to Related. And based on the maximum length of that process—a length of time that many, but not all, projects take—this was the final round of proposed developments that will be guaranteed a vote before the current City Council.

In the wake of November’s elections, the Council’s membership will change somewhat, starting Jan. 1—and perhaps the mayor will, too—adding uncertainty for developers in what can be a highly political process. The land-use review process is a formalized forum for debate over development projects, at the end of which the Council gives its binding vote.

Also making the cut: the proposed 1,250-foot, Jean Nouvel–designed slender skyscraper that would rise adjacent to MoMA; the Bloomberg administration’s incentive program designed to boost the number of new grocery stores in poorer neighborhoods; and the city’s plans to rezone the Broadway Triangle in northern Brooklyn.

Not every developer can be as fortunate as Related. Multiple high-profile large planned developments have been seeking public approval, but did not make Monday’s list. To name a few: Extell Development’s proposed 8.2-acre, 2,500-apartment development at Riverside South; Steven Roth’s potential new office tower where the Hotel Pennsylvania currently sits; and Community Preservation Corporations’ plans to build 2,400 apartments in Williamsburg on the former Domino Sugar Factory site.

Financing is, of course, in short supply, casting doubt on the immediate viability of such projects. But developers can reap great long-term benefits from getting rezonings now, as they clear the way for quicker construction starts when the market returns; and they typically boost property values substantially with added density allowed on sites.

As is traditional in New York development, discord between the applicants and various community, labor and other groups marks the seven-month land-use review, which includes numerous public hearings.

A collection of organizations are fighting Related’s Kingsbridge Armory project in an attempt to win wage and other concessions. Residents who live across from the MoMA tower are vehemently opposed, calling it an out-of-scale development that should not be in a mid-block location.

By far the largest project to start the public review process on May 18 was the West Side rail yards, of which Related is the designated developer (though it has yet to sign a contract for the land with the M.T.A., the owner). The eastern half of the site is already rezoned, so it is the western half that will be the subject of the approvals, and the accompanying debate.

Based on a framework agreed to in 2007 by the Bloomberg administration, the M.T.A. and Council Speaker Christine Quinn, the western half of the project calls for up to 6.4 million square feet of development, including up to 5,762 apartments.

The debate with the community is likely to revolve around familiar issues: The local community board has repeatedly expressed its desire to see the giant towers reduced in scale, and more affordable housing on the site, as currently it will be 20 percent of whatever Related builds as rental buildings. (The city is also building two developments with more than 300 subsidized apartments as part of the project.)

“The biggest problems are still its scale, which hasn’t changed one bit,” said Anna Levin, co-chair of a Community Board 4 land-use committee. Ms. Levin added that she is pleased with the improvements Related has made to the design of the open space.

______________________________

Image of massing layout for the western half, from the DEIS released last week...

http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/112738681/original.jpg

http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/112738730/original.jpg

http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/112738779/original.jpg

NYguy

May 28, 2009, 5:36 PM

http://www.observer.com/2009/slideshow/steve-ross-vision-west-side

Steve Ross' Vision for the West Side

http://www.observer.com/files/slideshow/wsy%20render_1.jpg

The seven-month public rezoning process kicked off last week for half of the West Side rail yards, the 26-acre development site just south of the Javits Center on the far West Side. Here’s a look at some of the plans from Stephen Ross’ Related Companies, the site’s designated developer. (That said, Related has yet to sign a contract for the project, which would ultimately entail $15 billion or so in new development. The contract is scheduled to be signed by January.)

Above, plans for both the eastern and western half of the yards. The eastern section (between Tenth and Eleventh Avenues) was rezoned in 2005, and now the western half is up for public approval.

NYguy

May 29, 2009, 6:43 AM

Zoning for the western half of the yards...
http://nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/env_review/western_rail/00_deis.pdf

As required in the proposed zoning, building massing and heights would gradually decrease from Eleventh Avenue and West 33rd Street to Twelfth Avenue and West 30th Street. The tallest building on the site would be the commercial building in the northeast corner. Taller residential buildings are proposed generally in the eastern and northern portions of the Development Site, and shorter residential buildings in the southwest quadrant of the Development Site (see Figure S-9). Building heights would generally range from approximately 40 to 70 stories, or 350 to 950 feet. WC-1 would be the tallest, at 850 to 950 feet, WR-6 would be between 650 and 810 feet, and WR-7 would be between 550 and 710 feet.

South of the commercial building on Eleventh Avenue, WR-1 would be approximately 700 to 800 feet high. To its west WR-5 would be shorter at approximately 500 to 700 feet. Along West 30th Street, buildings would also decrease in height from Eleventh Avenue to Twelfth Avenue. The tallest building at the southern portion of the Development Site would be located at
Eleventh Avenue, at approximately 650 to 810 feet (WR-2). Directly west of this mixed-use building would be an approximately 550 to 710-foot-tall mixed-use building (WR-3). The shortest building on the site would be at the southwest corner of the site, at a maximum height of 450 feet (WR-4).

THE BIG APPLE

Jun 3, 2009, 3:12 AM

I like the Brookfield plan. That was the best one.

hunser

Jun 3, 2009, 4:55 PM

so no supertalls for rhe hudson yards ... :( when are they going to realize that nyc needs new supertalls so badly?! :hell:

Dac150

Jun 3, 2009, 5:39 PM

You never know, just as plans changed to this they can change again. If companies want in, the believe me the developer will find a way. It's just a wierd time right now for that so they have to plan something the get something. Doesn't mean that what you see now is what you'll get, though I do feel this is another case and point time to building for the future.

NYguy

Jun 3, 2009, 9:04 PM

so no supertalls for rhe hudson yards

Not on the western yards, no. The tallest tower there is estimated to be no higher than 950 ft, but we are years away from a specific proposal there. The larger towers will be on the eastern yards, and although those towers would be developed sooner, we are still not close to any actual proposal there either.

http://www.observer.com/files/slideshow/wsy%20render_1.jpg

philvia

Jun 4, 2009, 7:23 PM

this has gone from awesome to fail... so sad.

NYguy

Jun 4, 2009, 10:39 PM

this has gone from awesome to fail... so sad.

Still too early to say on this. We have to see what gets proposed, especially on the eastern yards.

koolkid

Jun 5, 2009, 3:58 PM

NYguy

Jun 6, 2009, 11:15 PM

Definitely still too early. Besides, i do prefer the larger/taller towers to be more inland, away from the waterfront. That way, they'd stand out more rather than block out the towers behind them. So far I'm not all too disapointed with the heights, although they better get rid of all that useless green space, fast...

That green space is mandated. It's also mandated that the taller towers be farthest away from the waterfront, so there will be a stepped back approach to the river.

NYguy

Jun 9, 2009, 12:09 PM

http://www.nypost.com/seven/06092009/news/regionalnews/push_to_include_rail_area_in_west_side_g_173293.htm

PUSH TO INCLUDE RAIL AREA IN WEST SIDE GLORY

By TOM TOPOUSIS
June 9, 2009

Fresh off of today's public opening of the High Line Park, advocates for the project are turning their attention to saving one last unprotected section of the old rail trestle that snakes around the edge of the West Side rail yards.

Friends of the High Line want this section, running about a half-mile along 30th Street -- from 10th to 12th Avenue, then turning north to 33rd Street, along the edges of the rail yards and a block from the Javits Convention Center -- to be set aside as park space.

"It would be fantastic," Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday.

The Related Companies has been chosen by the MTA to develop a combination of office and residential towers, along with parks, a school and a cultural facility, on a platform over the 26-acre rail yards.

While Related officials have said they would include the High Line in their development plan, Friends of the High Line want the city to officially set it aside for preservation as part of a city rezoning for the site that is now under review.

"It's great that the High Line is in their plans, but there is no regulatory guarantee," said Peter Mullan of Friends of the High Line. "We feel that now is the time for that process to go forward along with the new zoning."

A forum on Related Companies' plans is to be held tomorrow at 6:30 p.m. in the Fulton Center Auditorium, at 119 Ninth Ave.

mrnyc

Jun 9, 2009, 11:58 PM

i think we have proved today, by the opening of the first section of the high line park, that it would be foolish to mess with the highline. however, i have attended community meetings about westside railyard development and related refuses to commit. in fact they even specifically alluded to wanting to tear down the spur because it's in their way on that corner.

hopefully this changes with new designs, but still the city really needs to protect this railyard section of the high line. hells bells on it's northernmost terminus the high line curls down to the ground right at the door of the javits convention center, a dream for nyc conventioneers!

NYguy

Jun 10, 2009, 12:09 AM

i think we have proved today, by the opening of the first section of the high line park, that it would be foolish to mess with the highline. however, i have attended community meetings about westside railyard development and related refuses to commit. in fact they even specifically alluded to wanting to tear down the spur because it's in their way on that corner.

They have long been saying that it would impede construction. Basically what they would do is remove it and replace it later. The only problem with the High Line at that point is that it would actually be lower than the platform the buildings will be built on.

Still, its in the latest plans to keep it there, and it would be an amazing experience to have that last link connecting the High Line to Hudson River Park.

http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/112738681/original.jpg

http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/112738730/original.jpg

mrnyc

Jun 10, 2009, 3:39 AM

no, unless that is new related did not talk about saving the spur. in fact although they were officially non-committal they made it clear it was in the way and they wanted to tear it down (in fact its not pictured at all on those renders). so as far as the spur goes i hope they have changed their minds, but this is exactly why the city must step in to protect the rest of the high line.

edit: re-reading your post i think you may have misinterpreted. the "spur" is just the part of the se corner that goes across 30th st and hangs over 10th avenue (another great future cut-out viewing platform!).

however, i will add they did verbally commit to keeping the rest of the railyard high line. that is, the major section that turns west, runs up 12th ave and wraps around the railyards to w34th st. that is what you see in renderings.

however, while i applaud related for facing the public, i wouldn't trust one bit of this verbal discussion to any developer. activism is still vitally important to protect the whole railyard section. here's news about the next cb4 forum:

Western Rail Yards Public Forum: June 10
We need your support at a Community Board 4 public forum on the Western Rail Yards - the next critical step in securing the High Line's full preservation.

Wednesday, June 10
6:30 - 8:30 PM
Sign-in begins at 6:00
Fulton Center Auditorium
119 Ninth Avenue, between 17th and 18th Streets

http://www.thehighline.org/about/rail-yards

for more clarity here is the map visual where you can clearly see the endangerd "spur."

http://www.thehighline.org/sites/files/images/high-line-context-map.jpg

NYguy

Jun 12, 2009, 5:16 PM

The railyards development is in a sleeping phase, and yet the NIMBYs aren't...
http://nyfi.observer.com/green/127/west-side-raily-yards-forum

Dispatch From West Side Rail Yards Forum

By Joe Pompeo and Eliot Brown
Friday, June 12, 2009

Manhattan's Community Board 4 held a forum Wednesday night about the Related Companies' plans for developing the West Side Rail Yards--a site adjacent to the new High Line Park, which opened to the public on Monday to rave reviews.

Some quick background: Related, which the M.T.A. selected to develop the site (but hasn't yet signed a contract), wants to create a mix of residential and commercial space, as well as parks, a school and a cultural center, on a platform built above the yards. Friends of the High Line, as the New York Post reported earlier this week, want to ensure that an unprotected, half-mile section of the old rail trestle is set aside as park space.

We sent Observer intern Alex Tafet to Wednesday's meeting, where he said a large lumber of people turned out in red "Save the High Line at the Rail Yards" t-shirts. Here are a few notes from his dispatch:

•Hudson Yards Community Advisory Committee Chair Anna Levin said permanent and affordable housing is the community's priority, with other goals being to preserve the High Line, create parking and public facilities, and incorporate the arts into the plans.

•Vishaan Chakrabarti, Related's executive vice president of design & planning, reiterated those goals, as well as the creation of a public school and promoting sustainability. The school, he said, would be a 120,000-square-foot, 750-seat facility for grades K-8.

•Mr. Chakrabarti's presentation also stated: Office and residential space would comprise as much as 2.2 million square feet and 4.4 million square feet respectively; there would be fewer retail shops and tall buildings closer to the water; there would be two 800-space parking garages underneath the parks and buildings; and that the High Line would be integrated into the new design.

•During the question-and-answer session that followed, one person asked how the new site might help fix Hell's Kitchen's "awful" infrastructure. Members of the West Side Neighborhood Alliance said there should be no building's taller than 66-feet. Several speakers said the plan didn't include enough affordable housing.

The community board is weighing in at this point as half the 26-acre site is going through the city's seven-month rezoning process. The next step will be a recommendation by the community board, and ultimately a vote by the City Council on the plan.

Busy Bee

Jun 12, 2009, 5:35 PM

66 feet. That's hilarious.

drumz0rz

Jun 12, 2009, 7:55 PM

samoen313

Jun 12, 2009, 9:40 PM

66 feet, are they kidding? The previously noted design would be such a good one. Tall buildings surrounded by parks, preserving the high line. No developer is going to be willing to pay the huge price to do this project if they can't build anything that'll be profitable (read: buildings under 66 feet tall) on the site. Isn't the Javits Center taller than 66 ft?

It most likely is. 66ft. would be six floors of residential or four to five of offices. I'd imagine this is purely to maintain continuity with Hell's Kitchen's scale.

NYguy

Jun 12, 2009, 10:56 PM

66 feet. That's hilarious.

It really is. I would like to have known just how this person came up with that ridiculous figure. One thing about those NIMBYs, just when you think you've heard the most absurd excuse, there's more.

NYguy

Jun 18, 2009, 5:08 PM

http://chelseanow.com/articles/2009/06/18/news/doc4a3a6af7eb4b8819042997.txt

http://images.townnews.com/chelseanow.com/content/articles/2009/06/18/news/doc4a3a6af7eb4b8819042997.jpg

NYguy

Jun 18, 2009, 5:09 PM

http://chelseanow.com/articles/2009/06/18/news/doc4a3a6af7eb4b8819042997.txt

Hudson Yards 'Himalayas' earn public ire at forum

June 18, 2009
By Diane Vacca

“We’re being handed crumbs,” said Marilyn Suroski, speaking at a public forum on the proposed Hudson Yards mega-project on Wed., June 10. “There’s far too little affordable housing.”

Many West Siders agreed with Suroski’s assessment of The Related Companies’ revised plan for the development of the Western Rail Yards. The 13-acre site, bounded by 11th Ave. and the Hudson River from 30th to 33rd Sts., will include one commercial and six residential towers set within five acres of open space.

Local advocates, no doubt encouraged by their success in trouncing plans for a stadium at the same site four years ago, vigorously denounced the “humongous” scale of the buildings and complained that provisions for affordable housing were woefully inadequate. Attendees of the forum also worried about what they perceived as a lack of planning for essential public facilities and demanded preservation of the northernmost portion of the High Line.

Community Board 4 and the Hudson Yards Community Advisory Committee, chaired by Anna Hayes Levin, had specified the need for permanently affordable housing for middle-income households integrated with the on-site market-rate housing. Instead, 20 percent of the approximately 5,000 residential units will be affordable for low-income households, while the middle-income permanently affordable housing will be built off-site at two locations in Hell’s Kitchen. After 20 years, the low-income, on-site affordable housing will revert to market-rate.

Vishaan Chakrabarti, Related’s executive vice president of design and planning, emphasized the revisions of the original proposal in response to community concerns. The plans for two buildings originally cantilevered over the High Line on the west side of the site were altered, with one building eliminated entirely and the other shifted away from the elevated park. There will now be a five-foot gap between the High Line and all buildings, Chakrabarti explained, and small open spaces will form a “necklace,” rather than one great space, as requested. The project will be sustainable, with a series of green roofs and the potential to return power to the grid. Board 4 had requested that commercial development be minimized and restricted to 11th Ave. and east, but most of the buildings will be mixed use, with retail on the ground floor.

Though Chakrabarti’s stated intention was to integrate the development into the city, several people pointed out that the combined effects of the high street wall and the absence of economic diversity, owing to the lack of permanently affordable housing, will create an isolated enclave divorced from the surrounding area.

Related has proposed a 750-seat, K-8 school on the site, but Assemblymember Richard Gottfried said in a statement that the school will accommodate only children living the Hudson Yards project area. A larger or second school is needed, he noted, to alleviate the severe classroom shortage in District 2.

Many feared that public services—such as water, electricity and sewage, as well as safety measures like a firehouse and adequate police protection—were being overlooked or inadequately planned for.

“We need these services in place before the people move in, before we need them, before the toilets start backing up,” said Elaine Marlovitch.

Although there will be an on-site firehouse, its location hasn’t been determined. Joe Restuccia, co-chairperson of Board 4’s Housing, Health and Human Services committee, warned that when the land rises in value, the city will find it impossible to compete for space with private interests.

Christine Berthet, co-chairperson of the board’s Transportation Planning Committee, was concerned that the two proposed garages of 800 spaces each would not be limited to accessory parking and would therefore be available to transient drivers. She also lamented the lack of a direct entrance to the subway. David Karnovsky, general counsel for the City Planning Commission, assured Berthet that the parking would be strictly accessory and the site would be connected to the subway “if we can find a way.”

Karnovsky also responded to the many people who wanted assurance regarding the future of the High Line. He denied that the High Line is at risk, because it is a “component of the open space network.” However, “We haven’t really finalized how we’re going to treat the High Line in the eastern yards yet,” he admitted. “We hope to resolve it.”

Although CB 4 had requested primarily residential development at reasonable density—“not monstrous buildings,” as Levin put it—Related is planning to build 5.7 million square feet distributed among seven buildings. These will be arranged in a cascade, with the tallest building—a commercial tower of 50 to 60 stories and 1.5 to 2.2 million square feet—at the northeast corner of the site and the lowest, 45 stories, at the southwest corner. The massive scale of the development—once jokingly referred to as the “Himalayas between Clinton and Chelsea” by Levin—unsurprisingly evoked many comments.

“You’re not listening to us,” said Chelsea resident Marguerite Yaghjian. “We’ve told you and told you time and again that we don’t want high buildings.”

Advocates also want more affordable housing, but not the way the Department of Housing, Preservation and Development and Related have proposed to provide it, at two off-site locations. One site for permanently affordable housing, owned by the Metropolitan Transit Authority, lies on the east side of Ninth Ave. between 54th and 53rd Sts. The area has an 85-foot (nine stories) height restriction and would yield 89 units. In order to provide 19 additional units, HPD is proposing a zoning change that would raise the allowable height to 115 feet (12 stories).

The second site, owned by the city, provides primary access to the city’s third water tunnel, which is now under construction. It lies in the heart of the Special Clinton District, on the west side of 10th Ave. between 48th and 49th Sts. The developable portion sits over the Amtrak rail cut, or half the site. The zoning of the Special District, which has a building-height restriction of 66 feet (seven stories) and a 60-foot rear-yard requirement, would allow construction of two buildings with a total of 119 units. HPD is proposing a zoning change in order to build a single, C-shaped building, 10 to 11 stories (99 feet high), with 204 units.

“We fought for 40 years for the Special District,” said Richard Marans, of the 47-48th St. Block Association. “Now to have the city come along and stick a knife in our back, put a nail in the coffin of the Special District and ruin what makes us special.”

He added that the community doesn’t consider the second affordable housing site on 10th Ave. to be in context with the neighborhood.

“We consider the huge, massive, Soviet-style wall will block out air and light,” Marans said.

Speaking anonymously, an actress added, “I want to live in a city with historical perspective. I don’t want to live in a city that all of a sudden grows higher and higher and higher so we forget our history. Where’s your passion for saving our beautiful, historical spot?”