Property owners claimed they could not be fined for lessees’ illegal outdoor advertisements. Four separate property owners leased space on their premises to companies that procured, erected, and/or maintained advertisements in the space. The leases were all long-term. The Department of Buildings issued multiple notices of violation to the owners charging them for failing to register as an outdoor advertising company, failing to obtain a permit or a proper permit for outdoor advertising signs, and … <Read More>
Search Results for: Dep’t of Buildings
Central Park West synagogue variance upheld
Court rejected neighbors’ article 78 challenge to nine-story mixed-use building adjacent to landmarked synagogue. Congregation Shearith Israel applied to BSA for a variance to build a nine-story mixed-used building adjacent to its landmarked synagogue at the corner of West 70th Street and Central Park West in the Upper West Side-Central Park West Historic District. In addition to the synagogue, Shearith Israel owns a four-story parsonage house to the south of the synagogue along Central Park … <Read More>
Court criticizes ESDC over Atlantic Yards
Court orders ESDC to consider whether extended timetable for project’s completion requires supplemental environmental review. In 2006, the Empire State Development Corporation approved the general project plan for Forest City Ratner Companies’ Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn. The $4 billion project includes a sports arena and sixteen high-rise buildings. Ratner agreed to purchase air rights from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority at the beginning of the project in order to facilitate the development of six … <Read More>
BSA’s denial of special permit upheld by Second Department
BSA found that project did not qualify as an enlargement. In 1999, BSA granted the owner of 155 Norfolk Street in Brooklyn a special permit to enlarge a one-story home. The enlargement was not built pursuant to the approved plans. More than three years later, the owner submitted a different set of plans to Buildings for an as-of-right enlargement and began construction. In 2005, after resolving a series of violations, the owner obtained an alteration … <Read More>
Court upsets Columbia’s eminent domain option
Property owners challenge ESDC’s authority to use eminent domain on behalf of Columbia. Looking to expand in West Harlem, Columbia University teamed up with the City’s Economic Development Corporation in 2001 to redevelop the area. Not long after, EDC issued a West Harlem Master Plan. The plan stated that West Harlem could be redeveloped through rezoning, and did not mention any blighted conditions in Manhattanville. Columbia began purchasing property in the area in 2002 for … <Read More>
Transient hotel order overturned
City claimed that West Side residential buildings were illegally converted to transient hotels. In October 2007, a lower court granted the City’s request for a preliminary injunction against three Upper West Side residential buildings, the Montroyal, the Continental, and the Pennington, ordering them to stop using the SROs as transient hotels. The court found that the transient use violated both the Zoning Resolution and the buildings’ certificates of occupancy. Although the multiple dwelling law allowed … <Read More>