Plan for seven buildings includes Boricua College campus, 679 residential units and over 36,000 sq.ft. of retail. The Department of Housing Preservation and Development proposed to amend the Melrose Commons Urban Renewal Area Plan in the Bronx to facilitate a large, seven building, mixed-use, residential and commercial complex called Boricua Village to be constructed on a 4.2-acre lot in the northeast corner of Melrose Commons.

HPD’s plan called for 18 changes to the existing Melrose Commons Urban Renewal Plan, which the City adopted in 1994 to encourage development in a 34- block area of the Bronx, roughly stretching from East 163rd Street to East 156th Street between St. Ann’s and Third Avenues to Melrose and Courtlandt Avenues. The amendments included changes in land use designations and the elimination of height limits, lot coverage requirements, street wall coverage provisions, and curb cut restrictions. HPD’s proposal also called for the rezoning of the entire 4.2-acre site to R8 with a C2-4 overlay to allow a higher residential floor area, and the disposition of 42 City-owned lots. (more…)