Quote:
Originally Posted by Onn
I get all that. But the problem is the city gave Related tax incentives to develop the Hudson Yards site which meant they could charge lower rates for their space. Meanwhile, WTC kind of got the shaft as far as tax breaks from the city government, at least for towers 2, 3, and 4. They should have either given Silverstein tax incentives to develop the site or companies tax incentives for moving to the new WTC site. I feel like the city shot themselves in the foot.
|
Silverstein got a lot more than tax breaks, and all of a
10 year headstart over the Hudson Yards. He has no direct competition Downtown, unlike the towers of the west side. His towers will sit over a
multi-billion dollar transportation hub, with multiple subway lines, and another newly built transit hub a block away, all connected. The Hudson Yards meanwhile will get one lone subway line. Yet, it is the Hudson Yards that has all of the momentum of office development. (Downtown, like the rest of New York, is experiencing a boom on residential tower development).
Silverstein has been handed the keys to success, and he will get it. The problem here, is what I don't think you and a lot of other people realize. I keep saying it, but that's because it's true - it takes time to absorb all of that space Downtown. We're talking 10 millions square feet of brand new office space. Downtown is comparable to Chicago, for example, in terms of office space, but you throw 10 msf of office space at one time on the market in Chicago, there will be issues with filling it. There's no particular reason why all of the WTC space has to be built at once, other than the fact that we want it to, so the rebuilding can be complete, and disruptions over.
But we can't have it both ways. Either the Port Authority builds out all 10 msf of space, and let it sit empty until it gradually fills, or subsidize the tenancy even more until more traditional tenants can move in. But no one wants to repeat that, and the towers and office space there are being subjected to the Downtown market. Even building that space doesn't guarantee that a company will move from Midtown to establish a headquarters there. Remember, it wasn't that long ago that Citigroup passed over the Hudson Yards, and decided to move headquarters Downtown. But where did they decide to go?
Not the WTC. That's not to say the WTC won't get its tenants. It will. But it would be foolish to freeze the rest of the city until that happens. You don't starve one part of town to feed another.
For one thing, Midtown Manhattan is not without its own issues, largest among them the age of it's office stock. New York is a large city, and in the grand scheme of things, the WTC's 10 msf may seem like a drop that should have been filled already. But Downtown is also a market of its own, and consider how much office space has been built there other than the WTC over the past decade or two.
Quote:
People (including businesses) come to New York expecting to see a rebuilt WTC. Instead their going to get something totally different, while the WTC sits and waits for completion. I just get that feeling like you can't build something new before rebuilding what was once there. Hudson Yards is not helping return faith in lower Manhattan.
|
And that is not the mission of the Hudson Yards. If that's what you think it is, you've lost the point of it entirely. But people who visit Downtown will see a vastly improving Downtown, much better than it was pre 9/11. It's not the WTC alone that shows the faith in Downtown, though with two of the towers all but completed, and soon to be filling with tenants, its hard to see that as a failure. The crowds of tourists who swarm the area each day don't see it that way. They look up, and point & shoot. They couldn't do that if there were nothing there.