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 West and a four-story community house to the west of the synagogue along West 70th Street. Shearith Israel planned to demolish the community house to build the project. The proposed building’s first four floors would be occupied by community facility uses, including adult education classrooms, a Jewish day school, and a synagogue reception and banquet area. The top five floors would be developed into five market-rate condominiums.

The majority of Shearith Israel’s zoning lot is zoned R10A, but a portion of the lot along West 70th Street is zoned R8B. Shearith Israel needed the variance because the 105-foot building would violate, among other things, the zoning resolution’s maximum building height and setback regulations. Prior to applying to BSA, Shearith Israel obtained approval from Landmarks to demolish the community house and build the proposed mixed-use development.  (more…)

First of three proposed historic district extensions in area met with mix of support and opposition. On March 22, 2011, Landmarks heard testimony on the proposed Riverside-West End Historic District Extension I in Manhattan’s Upper West Side. The extension would encompass 190 properties to the south of the original Riverside-West End Historic District designated in 1989. The proposed district would extend from West 87th to West 79th Streets and include Broadway, West End Avenue, and Riverside Drive. In November 2010 Landmarks calendared the proposed district along with the Riverside-West End Historic District Extension II and the West End-Collegiate Historic District Extension. The three districts would bring more than 700 new properties on Manhattan’s West Side under Landmarks’ jurisdiction.

The West End section of the Upper West Side was developed in three distinct waves between the 1880s and the late 1920s. The first wave, following the opening of the Ninth Avenue elevated rail line in 1879, consisted primarily of three- and four-story rowhouses in a variety of styles, including Queen Anne, neo-Grec, and Renaissance Revival. Following the opening of the Broadway subway line in 1904, property values increased, making rowhouse development impractical. Developers began constructing large apartment buildings that catered to affluent tenants. Middleclass residents migrated to the area during the economic downturn after the First World War, which spurred the construction of taller apartment buildings with smaller units and setbacks that conformed to the 1916 zoning resolution. (more…)

Proposed eight-story hotel would replace collapsed building on throughblock lot fronting Chambers and Reade Streets. On February 8, 2011, Landmarks considered Fishman Holdings’ proposal to build a new eight-story hotel on a now-vacant lot at 87 Chambers Street in Manhattan’s Tribeca South Historic District. The through-block lot has frontages on Chambers and Reade Streets and is located between Church Street and Broadway. In 2008, Landmarks approved Fishman Holdings’ plan to convert the lot’s dilapidated store-and-loft building into a hotel. In 2009, however, the building partially collapsed and Buildings ordered that the entire structure be demolished. The current proposal closely adheres to the massing of the previously approved project.

According to David West, of Goldstein Hill & West Architects, the new building would rise six stories and then set back fifteen feet before rising two additional stories. The set-back floors and rooftop mechanical equipment would only be visible from limited vantage points. The building’s ground floor frontages would feature metal and glass storefronts, and cast-iron columns salvaged from the collapsed building would be incorporated into the Reade Street frontage. The upper floors would be divided into four bays and clad in limestone with granite accents. The Chambers Street and Reade Street facades would feature different fenestration. The hotel’s entrance lobby would be located along the Reade Street frontage, with retail or restaurant use on the ground floor along Chambers Street. The overall building height would be one foot taller than the previously approved proposal. (more…)

Developer agreed to fund larger on-site school and provide on-site affordable housing. On December 8, 2010, the City Council’s Land Use Committee modified Extell Development Company’s proposal to develop a three million sq.ft. mixed-use project on a site bounded by West 59th and West 61st Streets and West End Avenue and Riverside Boulevard in Manhattan’s Upper West Side. The project, known as Riverside Center, will include five buildings, ranging in height from 31 to 44 stories; 2.75 acres of publicly accessible open space; and an on-site public elementary school. Extell will also extend Freedom Place South and West 60th Street.

The 8.2-acre project site comprises the three remaining undeveloped parcels of the Riverside South development plan first approved by the City in 1992 to govern the redevelopment of the rail yards extending from West 59th Street to West 72nd Street. To facilitate the project’s development, Extell submitted multiple applications including modifications to height and setback requirements and special permits for 1,800 below-ground parking spaces. (more…)

Sanitation proposed to reopen marine waste transfer station near Asphalt Green and Bobby Wagner Walk. After the Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island closed in 2001, the Department of Sanitation contracted with privately-owned transfer stations, landfills, and waste-to-energy facilities to dispose of residential waste. Sanitation now delivers a large percentage of waste to transfer stations within the City, where tractor- trailers pick up the waste and drive it to landfills in other states.

In 2004, Mayor Bloomberg announced a new 20-year solid waste management plan. The City’s marine waste transfer stations would containerize solid waste onsite, and private companies would transport it by barge or rail, thereby reducing truck traffic and long-term costs. The marine waste transfer station at East 91st Street, bounded by the East River to the north and east, Carl Schurz Park to the south, and FDR Drive to the west, would be redeveloped to containerize waste generated in Manhattan. Sanitation trucks would access the transfer station using an elevated ramp that crossed over Asphalt Green, a sports and recreational complex located between York Avenue and FDR Drive. (more…)