NEW YORK | 343 Madison Avenue | 844 FT | 49 FLOORS

[NYguy]

Originally Posted by Submariner

Is this going to be an entire block development?

No. The two buildings around the corner will remain.

“Our East Midtown Rezoning provided a way to responsibly increase the economic value of one of the city’s most vibrant and transit-oriented areas,” said Vicki Been, New York City Deputy Mayor for Housing and Economic Development. “This transaction builds on our success to date at One Vanderbilt and 270 Park Ave by further generating first class space to attract new businesses and good jobs to the City while ensuring the new developments invest in transit and public spaces that will benefit the business district and everyday New Yorkers.”

I'm waiting to see this carry over to the Grand Hyatt location.

[Crawford]

Smaller footprint means taller tower, so I hope Boston Properties doesn't buy the rest of the block.

But I think, in any case, we're getting a huge tower. If the MTA is getting >$1 billion for development rights we're talking a very large building. Plus there are tons of additional transferable air rights available.

[Hudson11]

This site also has an exceptionally lucrative FAR bonus thanks to the initial 1 Vanderbilt rezoning which preceded the overall Midtown East district's approval. I think it goes up to 30, which is significant.

[NYguy]

^ Yeah, it has a 30 FAR.

Originally Posted by Crawford

Smaller footprint means taller tower, so I hope Boston Properties doesn't buy the rest of the block.

But I think, in any case, we're getting a huge tower. If the MTA is getting >$1 billion for development rights we're talking a very large building. Plus there are tons of additional transferable air rights available.

We're looking at about 1 msf, which with that footprint would still be pretty tall for an office tower. Could still be a supertall, though not necessarily.

I believe the Yale Club building will remain.










That would give us the 3 Madison Ave buildings (341-347) for the development...

[JMKeynes]

The Yale Club is landmarked. I don't think that 52 Vanderbilt is. Therefore, I assume that BP would try to acquire it and incorporate that parcel into its site. I hope that they don't because it likely would lead to a very odd, L-shaped box.

If only the Madison Ave properties compose the site, it will be a shallow lot; therefore, a very tall, thin tower would likely rise.

https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/planning...cpc/170171.pdf

[NYguy]

A look at the sites via GoogleEarth...



























I think the small MTA vent building will remain...

[Busy Bee]

I think the small MTA vent building will remain...

I hope not. It would be pretty wasteful to not take advantage of that airspace and butt up right against the Yale Club building. That would look fantastic. The vent could easily be accommodated in the base of the new tower.

[NYguy]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

I hope not. It would be pretty wasteful to not take advantage of that airspace and butt up right against the Yale Club building. That would look fantastic. The vent could easily be accommodated in the base of the new tower.

Yeah, but it’s not just there as a decoration. Maybe they can incorporate it into the design, like they did at 55 Hudson.




https://www.structuremag.org/?p=12098

[matt19215]

Originally Posted by Submariner

Is this going to be an entire block development?

No, its only half the bock
https://earth.google.com/web/@40.754...iBBdmUYAiABKAI

[NYguy]

This has been on hold for years, so whatever development plans Boston Properties has may be revealed before long.



https://www.amny.com/transit/mta-to-...rus-continues/

MTA to redevelop former HQ as ‘liquidity crisis’ from coronavirus continues


Mark Hallum
April 2, 2020

The MTA – in the thick of a “liquidity” crisis from ridership loss – went looking for loose change and found some in the possibility of redeveloping the property at 341-7 Madison Ave., the agency announced.

In other words, the MTA plans to use its former headquarters in East Midtown in a partnership with the city to generate $1 billion for capital investments through a redevelopment strategy.

The MTA opened the property up to proposal from the real estate industry with the city government envisioning a development similar to One Vanderbilt and 270 Park Ave., both high-rise office buildings in Midtown. The new commercial space located near public transit will be “first-class,” according to Vicki Been, New York City Deputy Mayor for Housing and Economic Development.

[NYguy]

https://therealdeal.com/2020/04/03/v...son-ave-fight/

Virus crisis prompts MTA, city to end 347 Madison Ave fight
Tax revenue from office tower project will go to transit agency





April 03, 2020
By Erik Engquist

The governor has said New Yorkers coping with the coronavirus crisis should look for a silver lining. Now, his transit agency and his favorite mayor have found one.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority has reached a deal with Mayor Bill de Blasio on how to share revenue on the redevelopment of the MTA’s former Madison Avenue headquarters by a private-sector player.

It took years to come to terms. The MTA initially sought to capture the project’s revenue stream directly — some $1.3 billion over a 99-year ground lease — but the city wanted property taxes from the developer, slated to be Boston Properties.

Eventually, they decided to route $600 million through the city and into transit improvements, counting that money toward de Blasio’s pledge to contribute $2.66 billion toward the MTA’s unfinished 2015 to 2019 capital plan.

But the idea was hardly novel. Something had changed: The coronavirus pandemic has battered the transit agency and city government alike, costing each entity billions of dollars (and afflicting Patrick Foye, the MTA’s chairman and CEO, with Covid-19).

For both parties, the sooner the 1960s-era structure and two similar adjoining buildings can be replaced with a modern, rent-generating office building, the better.

Originally called the Equitable Trust Building, 347 Madison Avenue, at East 45th Street, served as the MTA headquarters for 35 years — along with 341 and 345 Madison — until the agency decided in 2011 that it needed money more than an office tower in the heart of Midtown.

In 2014 the MTA moved the top layer of its infamously extensive bureaucracy to 2 Broadway and has since been shelling out about $4 million a year to maintain the 20-story building it abandoned. Boston Properties was conditionally selected from among nine bidders to turn it into a 900,000-square-foot cash machine.

The de Blasio administration touts the pending project as fruit from the Midtown East rezoning it ushered through the City Council in 2017. Over the life of the ground lease, 347 Madison Avenue is expected to generate more than $1 billion for transit projects, including a new subway entrance on Madison Avenue with a direct connection to Grand Central Terminal and the Long Island Rail Road terminal slated to open underneath it in 2022.

The agreement was needed for the Madison Avenue project to begin the city’s land-use review process. That requires City Council approval — and another round of negotiations, albeit this time with a seven-month time limit. Requests from the local member could include privately owned public spaces, local hiring, streetscape improvements, cash for local nonprofits and community meeting space.

[Sky88]

So we'll have a new 900,000-square-foot tower at 347 Madison Ave. I hope that tower will be of 1,250 - 1,300 ft tall.

[JMKeynes]

Originally Posted by Sky88

So we'll have a new 900,000-square-foot tower at 347 Madison Ave. I hope that tower will be of 1,250 - 1,300 ft tall.

I really hope that they don't acquire 52 Vanderbilt. An L-shaped site would suck. I could see a ridiculous, boring, 800' tower rising there if that occurs.

[NYguy]

Originally Posted by Sky88

So we'll have a new 900,000-square-foot tower at 347 Madison Ave. I hope that tower will be of 1,250 - 1,300 ft tall.

It likely won't be that tall, and it doesn't need to be. Not everything needs to be a supertall. For this site in particular, I don't really care about the height. An outstanding design would be great here. We'll see what we get from Boston Properties. Keep in mind that the rezoning here wasn't to build supertall skyscrapers, but to replenish the old and outdated office space. So a new 1 msf office tower here would be great. That's also the amount that Tower Fifth would contribute.



I went back to look at the MTA agreement, and for clarification on the vent issue, that site is already included as well (marked in blue below). But it won't be demolished, so it will be cantilevered over, or integrated into the design.




















A look back on the selection process...

[Busy Bee]

"1960s-era structure"

What kind of dope would write that?

[NYguy]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

"1960s-era structure"

What kind of dope would write that?

His mind must have been on 270 Park or something else. They are all pre-war office buildings.

[mrnyc]

dont mind this half a block going away at all for something nice. we'll see i guess.

[NYguy]

Originally Posted by mrnyc

dont mind this half a block going away at all for something nice. we'll see i guess.

Yeah, they've been sitting on this for a while, so I guess it would be safe to say they have some idea or plan on how to move forward at this point. They should at least be ready to begin the approval process.

I actually wish I could have seen all of the proposals. Boston Properties seems to have been 1 of 2 strictly office/retail proposals. Interesting that Macklowe was involved. Maybe he abandoned this to concentrate on the Tower Fifth proposal? That's only a few blocks away.

[NYer34]

I'm sorry to see these buildings go. As pre-WWII masonry buildings these represent an architectural grace and uniqueness that we'll never see again.

They also come from a time when NYC was hands-down the greatest city in the world. Similar to the 19th-century government structures in London, they have an energy and a cockiness that later modernist structures lack. They just need a good power-washing.

Frankly there's more than enough postwar modernist garbage on Madison, in Midtown East, and around the city generally that development should focus there. (And what a flaming bag of dog excrement was the decision to NOT tear down the POS Bank of America building at Madison and 43rd.)

Leave our dwindling stock of pre-war buildings for posterity.

[NYguy]

I'm not one of those people who love bricks more than I love the city itself, especially when there's no real danger of losing anything. But what's fascinating to me is watching the efforts made by the city to simultaneously create a new business district, pretty much on a blank slate, and renew an already established, but fading business district. Where on the west side you have whole blocks assembled for development, on the east side the sites are smaller, and even then require some form of assemblage for the most part.

On the west side, you get massive +2 msf office towers, on the east side, even a +1 msf office tower is seen as a massive addition. And that's because on the east side, it's all about the addition of new space.

This tower may not be gigantic by Hudson Yards standards, but for a district that has basically been starved of new office space over decades, it's huge. And what the midtown east rezoning did was to basically remove the constraints on development. Development on both the east and west side comes for a price (or a shakedown, depending on how you look at it), which is basically for the benefit of the city. And on the east side, there are very strict confines on even that.

Anyway, a look at some of the potential east side development sites outside the Vanderbilt corridor. Keep in mind this is not everything that can be redeveloped, but just an idea the city got from talking to land owners at the time.





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