LPC Approval of Town House Addition Followed a Transparent Public Process

In a recent CityLand commentary, Noel Weekes from the Committee for the Preservation of the Hamilton Heights/Sugar Hill Historic District incorrectly states that the Landmarks Preservation Commission approved a non-compliant addition at 280 Convent Avenue. The article claims that the proposed addition violates “at least five of the Landmarks Commission’s nine requirements for rear yard additions or enlargements to row houses in historic districts.” While applications for additions can be complicated and sometimes controversial, … <Read More>


Mayor de Blasio’s Land Use Appointments Carousel Continues

Mayor de Blasio has re-structured the City’s land use administrative hierarchy to further his affordable housing agenda. On July 22, 2014, Mayor Bill de Blasio nominated Margery Perlmutter to serve as Chair of the Board of Standards and Appeals. This was the Mayor’s latest appointment  to City land-use positions, all of which will bear heavily on the Mayor’s expansive affordable housing agenda, a ten-year plan designed to preserve some 200,000 units of affordable housing.


Proposed Reforms to Improve the Landmarks Preservation Commission

The Landmarks Law, enacted in 1965 to preserve the city’s architectural, historical and cultural resources, contains few standards about what merits designation and few rules governing the process.  This has resulted in broad brush designations that are of questionable significance and that are impeding the City’s larger planning, economic development, and housing efforts.  It is time to amend the Landmarks Law to bring designations more in line with other city policies, provide more timely information … <Read More>


Author Ralph Ellison’s Former Riverside Apartment Complex Considered for Landmarking [UPDATE: Beaumont Designated]

See below for update.

Residents, local cultural organizations, and preservationists testified in support of designation of ornate Arts & Crafts-style apartment building; owners deny any architectural significance. On June 18, 2013, the Landmarks Preservation Commission held a hearing on the potential individual landmark designation of the Beaumont Apartments, at 730 Riverside Drive at the corner of 150th Street, in Harlem. The building was constructed in 1912-1913 to the designs of George and Edward Blum, … <Read More>


City Planning’s Carol Samol on Redevelopment in the Bronx and Reforming the City’s Land Use Review Process

As director of the Department of City Planning’s Bronx Office, Carol Samol uses zoning tools to promote sustainable economic development in the Bronx. She has also participated as a leader in a broader City effort to reform the City’s Uniform Land Use Review Procedure’s pre-certification process.

Journey to the Bronx. Samol grew up in the upper Ohio Valley near Wheeling, West Virginia and studied English at Berea College, a small liberal arts college in Kentucky. … <Read More>


Thank you for visiting CityLand’s new website

CityLand started in 2004 as a monthly printed newsletter published by the Center for New York City Law at New York Law School. It comprehensively reports New York City’s land use decisions. Agencies covered include the City Planning Commission and the Department of City Planning; the Board of Standards and Appeals; the Landmarks Preservation Commission; the City Council; and related land use judicial decisions.

CityLand tracks public and private land use applications subject to the … <Read More>