High sewer costs justified variance for senior residence

Senior housing to be constructed on Clove Road in Staten Island. Developers sought a variance from BSA for a three-story, 40-foot high, 34,542-square-foot senior housing facility at 908 Clove Road in Staten Island. The proposed senior residence exceeded total floor area, street wall height, total height, curb cut, and driveway width.

At BSA, the developers, R. Randy Lee and Frank Naso, argued that the site’s 603-foot distance from the nearest sewer connection significantly increased construction … <Read More>


Residential variance approved for waterfront site

Residential development on College Point manufacturing site approved. Jung Kyu Lee owned a 496,604- square-foot lot split between commercial and manufacturing zoning districts along the East River in College Point, Queens. He constructed 58 two-family homes as-of-right on the commercially-zoned portion, leaving the 144,325-square-foot manufacturing portion vacant and inaccessible from the closest street. Lee then applied to BSA to construct 28 new two-family homes on the manufacturing portion.

Lee argued that manufacturing uses would be … <Read More>


Not-for-profit wins variance to build youth housing

Studio apartments approved for Bronx manufacturing site. The not-for- profit, Audubon Housing Development Fund Corporation, applied for a variance to construct a 36,596- square-foot building with 60 studio apartments to house youths who no longer qualified for foster care and low-income young adults. The project site, located on three lots along East 176th Street and Third Avenue in the Bronx, required a use variance because the site was zoned for manufacturing.

Borough President Adolfo Carrión, … <Read More>


Greenwich/Canal Street project gets 5 variances

Luxury apartments approved once developer reduced the height and size. Red Brick Canal LLC sought approval to construct an 11-story, 25,025-square-foot residential and commercial building at 482 Greenwich Street, a lot with frontage along Greenwich and Canal Streets at the border of Tribeca and SoHo in Manhattan. The project site, a 3,136-square-foot, trapezoidshaped lot located in a commercial zone (C6-2A), currently contains an unused gas station which will be demolished. The City had rezoned the … <Read More>


Variance denied to homeowner in legal trouble

Queens homeowner sought to legalize lot split to allow sale to proceed. Pei Yu Zhong proposed to split her 11,475-square-foot lot, containing a one-family house, garage and swimming pool, into two developable lots and construct a new home to replace the pool and garage. After receiving a preliminarytax lot from the Department of Finance and a subdivision approval from Buildings, Zhong applied for a new building permit in January 2003. While Buildings was completing its … <Read More>


Aeronautics school gets variance for new dorm

New dormitory next to LaGuardia to house 200 students. The Vaughn College of Aeronautics and Technology operates a school on a sevenacre site at 90th Street and Ditmars Boulevard opposite LaGuardia Airport in Queens. Vaughn applied to BSA for a variance to build its first dormitory on an undeveloped portion of its lot. The three-story, 200- bed dorm would exceed height limits and yard requirements.

Vaughn argued that the proposed dorm was necessary to attract … <Read More>