Aerial View of Willets Point with Convention Center to the North. Image: Courtesy of EDC.

Willets Point 126th Street Across from CitiField. Image: Courtesy of EDC.

City targeting 12.75-acre site adjacent to Citi Field for first phase of construction. On May 9, 2011, The City’s Economic Development Corporation issued a request for proposals seeking a developer for Phase 1 of the Willets Point District redevelopment plan in Queens. The triangle-shaped Willets Point District comprises 61.4 acres generally bounded by Northern Boulevard, the Van Wyck Expressway, and 126th Street. The contentious redevelopment plan was approved by the City Council in November 2008. 5 CityLand 167 (Dec. 2008).

The Phase 1 site is a 12.75-acre parcel along 126th Street and Roosevelt Avenue across from Citi Field. The approved program for Phase 1 construction would permit up to 400 units of mixed-income housing, 680,000 sq.ft. of retail space, and 387 hotel rooms. The developer must create at least 2.08 acres of publicly accessible open space. There will be 7.5 acres of unbuilt area buffering the Phase 1 site. (more…)

Columbia University proposes northward expansion; CB 9 seeks industrial jobs and affordable housing. On October 3, 2007, the Planning Commission held a public hearing on Columbia University’s and Manhattan Community Board 9’s competing plans for the future of West Harlem.

Under Columbia’s plan, the City would rezone 35 acres of Manhattanville, a section of West Harlem currently zoned primarily for manufacturing, and create a Special Manhattanville Mixed-Use District stretching from West 125th to West 135th Streets, between Broadway and the Hudson River. Within this new district, Columbia would construct a 17-acre academic mixed-use development that would include academic building space, university housing, recreation space, and retail space. 4 CityLand 89 (July 15, 2007). (more…)