Zoning change to allow wind turbines and heliostats

Computerized heliostats will redirect sunlight from top of new green highrise down to Teardrop Park South. The City Council approved a text amendment that allows for a new class of permitted rooftop obstructions on residential buildings in the Special Battery Park City District in Manhattan: wind turbines and heliostats, which are mirrors that redirect sunlight to spaces cast in shadow.

The Battery Park City Authority has invested $355,000 to install three heliostats, eight feet in … <Read More>


High Line/Chelsea Rezoning Gets Go Ahead

Rezoning crafted to transform High Line into elevated open space; no mandatory affordable housing requirement set, despite community’s request. On June 23, 2005, the City Council approved the complicated rezoning and land acquisition plan for West Chelsea that has as its central goal the transformation of the High Line, an elevated rail line, into a 1.45-mile open space.

The approved rezoning impacts the area between Tenth and Eleventh Avenues from West 17th to West 30th … <Read More>


North Brooklyn Rezoning Gains Final Approval

Full Council approves Greenpoint- Williamsburg rezoning. On May 11, 2005, the full Council approved the rezoning plan for a two-mile area in the North Brooklyn neighborhoods of Williamsburg and Greenpoint. Only Council Member Charles Barron voted against the plan to transform the primarily manufacturing-zoned area to large and small-scale residential. Council’s Land Use Committee had modified the rezoning proposal and sent it back to the Planning Commission, which approved the modifications.


Council Modifies Massive Rezoning Plan for Brooklyn

Affordable housing incentive increased; new industrial protection zone proposed. The City Council’s Land Use Committee voted to modify the 183-block rezoning plan for the two-mile East River waterfront in Greenpoint and Williamsburg at a May 2, 2005 hearing attended by Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff, Planning Commission Chair Amanda M. Burden, and HPD Commissioner Shaun Donovan.

The Land Use Committee had scheduled the vote at 11:00 a.m., but delayed the hearing until late afternoon to allow … <Read More>


New zoning district approved for Bayside

New district created to curb development of Queens “McMansions.” On March 14, 2005, the Planning Commission unanimously approved the Bloomberg administration’s largest proposed down-zoning to date and a new citywide zoning district to be applied first to Bayside, a Queens neighborhood characterized predominantly by single-family detached homes. The approved 350-block down-zoning of Bayside, commenced at the urging of Council Member Tony Avella and local residents, seeks to end the rising development in Bayside of semi-detached … <Read More>


Anticipated Rezoning Approved with Changes

Affordable housing incentives, as well as height, massing and manufacturing zones, revised before approval. Over the disapproval votes of Commissioners Karen Phillips and Dolly Williams, the remaining members of the Planning Commission approved the rezoning of a two-mile area along the East River waterfront in Brooklyn’s Greenpoint and Williamsburg neighborhoods after modifications were crafted to address public officials and residents’ comments.

The six linked applications, including text, map and City map amendments to create park … <Read More>