[NYguy]

the LPC determined Wednesday that the building “does not meet the criteria for individual landmark designation.”

I don't know what they were expecting. They have previously gotten this message, but I guess it didn't sink in.

The bookstore’s management had requested that the city evaluate the property to determine if it qualifies for landmark protection. In a letter obtained by International Business Times, Marry Beth Betts, a commission researcher, said a senior staff committee carefully reviewed the building but declined to recommend it for further consideration as an individual New York City Landmark.

The bookstore had apparently argued for landmark status on the grounds that the building, not far from Steinway Hall, was once the location of a piano showroom, and is therefore a historic remnant of the city’s influential piano industry. The commission, however, pointed out that it has already commemorated that industry through the designation of Steinway Hall and its first-floor reception room, among other locations.

“The committee recommends that these sites, in comparison to 31 W. 57th Street, provide a better representation of the piano’s industry’s historic significance to New York City,” Betts wrote.

This Gale Brewer is already on my nerves...


http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20140326...rotect-rizzoli-bookstore-from-demolition

The decision came a day after Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer wrote a letter urging the commission to hold a public hearing as soon as possible to consider landmarking the building's interior and exterior in the hopes of protecting it from the wrecking ball. Brewer's office had filed a formal request to have the building landmarked on March 21.

....While the Lefrak family and Vornado have not said what they plan to do with the land if the bookstore is demolished, many believe they will build another 57th Street skyscraper, like One57.

"The addition of another individual landmark would firmly establish for the future Piano Row's place in New York City history, while the loss of this fabric for another tower will degrade what is so wonderful about West 57th Street," Brewer wrote.