Saving Place Exhibit. Image Credit: Museum of the City of New York.

Sometimes-contentious debate focused on the struggle to balance new development with historic preservation in New York City. On the evening of April 20, 2015, the Museum of the City of New York commenced a series of events and exhibitions commemorating the 50th anniversary of the City’s Landmarks Law with a symposium titled “Redefining Preservation for the 21st Century.” The Saving Place exhibit, intends to examine the “impact of a landmark preservation movement that has transformed the City and has been an engine of New York’s growth and success.” The exhibit is curated by the Museum’s Donald Albrecht and Columbia’s Andrew Dolkart, with Seri Worden, of the James Marston Fitch Charitable Foundation, serving as consulting curator. The Symposium took place at the New York Academy of Medicine’s Hosack Hall. (read more…)

Steven Spinola, President of the Real Estate Board of New York

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 on potential designations, and earlier guidance on design options for historic districts.

The Law has enabled the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) to protect a wide range of noteworthy properties, such as Grand Central Terminal and Lever House, as well as a collection of buildings that represent a distinct section of the city, such as Greenwich Village and Brooklyn Heights.  The Law has also been used to landmark properties that have no architectural or historical merits, such as vacant lots, parking lots, and significantly-altered buildings.  Needless to say, these are not properties of what the Law envisioned protecting when it was established nearly 50 years ago. (read more…)

Steven Spinola, president of REBNY

The Landmarks Preservation Commission’s (LPC) process for designating New York City historic districts is being used more and more to take the place of zoning.  The designation of historic districts has been pursued to promote many different agendas: to address issues of height and scale, to stop new development and to limit development on vacant or near-vacant sites by purposefully including these sites within the boundaries of historic districts.  These objectives are contrary to the intent of the NYC Landmarks Law and touch on actions specifically disallowed by that law, such as limiting the height and bulk of buildings and other characteristics governed by zoning regulations.

This continuing drift toward misusing the landmarks law as a planning tool to limit change across entire neighborhoods is evident in the remarks by Otis Pearsall, a noted preservationist, at the 2011 Fitch Forum symposium on the history of preservation law:

(read more…)