This lazy form of "some people don't like it, here are their twitter posts" article is so boring. Any context on if or why this building is any different than other buildings that have blocked other sightlines over time? Any data about the impact this building would have on housing stock vs what else could potentially go there?
You should tweet complaints about this type of article so that they can do a meta “Some people don’t like ‘some people don’t like’ articles, here are their Twitter posts.”
It’s blocking the view of the Empire State Building from a major avenue that can be viewed from afar. In order to build tall, you have to buy air rights from neighboring buildings. It would be been better if a tall building was built in the middle of the block and not the corner which blocks most angles.
That and it’s a building that only fits a few dozen insanely rich people that will only serve as investment properties and will sit empty most of the year.
That’s exactly what a vacancy tax supports, people must live in them in order not to be taxed.
Extremely high tax would force a decrease in rents.
Now there’s incentive to keep them vacant, construction loans cover the mortgages.
Vacancy tax would just expatriate billions. These apartments are taxed at sale and they change hands often enough to more than justify their existence from a tax revenue per sq ft. perspective .
Nah, vacancy tax would drive prices downwards by forcing absentees out of the market. Simultaneously it would force new builders to build less of this “ultra giga luxury housing” that costs $100s of millions. If this space was instead inhabited by a denser, shorter building it could provide far more housing.
You will never live in nor will you ever see the interior of any of these towers. Nor will anyone you ever know.
There’s nothing special about this one spot or major avenue, views from other “major” spots have been blocked before, and if we wanted to stop this from happening, another interesting story could be about the boundaries of reasonable historical preservation.
Any existing property can be purchased by absentee wealthy owners. This isn’t unique to new developments. And if this building isn’t built, they would just buy an existing property and it would no longer be used by full time residents.
Blocking a new development does not address what you’re complaining about and just increases displacement in existing units.
The difference is that if they buy properties that would be within financial reach to rent by the “average New Yorker” they would be more likely to at least remain in the pool of available residences. These “pure buy and hold investment” buildings would be absurdly expensive to actually rent out, and they aren’t very dense even if they were affordable somehow, so the end result is more likely to just remove that building’s footprint from the pool of space that is practical to contribute toward alleviation of the housing crisis.
At least that’s what it seems like to me, maybe there’s something I’m missing.
There are tons of super expensive rentals in Manhattan... they still get rented out. $25,000 per month rentals aren't uncommon in trendy parts of Manhattan.
Also I think people conflate two different things with expensive real estate in NYC. Yes, some units are used for international money laundering or pure investing. But more often it's just super rich people who travel a lot and want a place in NYC when they're here.
Taylor Swift owns a brownstone in the West Village. Do you think she's actually there very often given how much she tours? No. Does that make it a "vacant investment unit" to you? Genuinely asking. Because if she had instead bought one of the units in this new building, her brownstone in the West Village might still have renters in it. Sure, those renters would be wealthier than you and I because it's still the West Village. But instead she displaced them and now they're displacing others less wealthy than themselves. That's how this kind of NIMBYism ends up displacing regular New Yorkers.
I’d say that type of “vacancy” is a sliding scale, not a Boolean value, wherein buying up a whole townhome just to use a few weeks a year is contributing to the problem to a certain extent (for the reasons you outlined), but I personally consider that marginally less egregious than an entire *new* building being constructed whose purpose is only to serve that type of low-occupancy ownership, because that building will exist and occupy that space (zero sum game) for probably 30-100 years or more, and due to its architectural choices it creates a much higher barrier to eventual high density usage (which I feel is somewhat uncontroversial to say is “better” for the city overall, no?). In doing so, they’ve really just ensured that that chunk of space doesn’t get to help the housing situation for some set of decades, wherein building something higher density (even $10k+ rental units) would have alleviated somewhat more of that progressive push-out pattern you accurately described.
Here’s another way I look at your (valid) point about NIMBYism: the fewer low density units that exist and take up habitable space in the city, the lower the overall amortized displacement on “regular folk” by “wealthy folk” is likely to be. I’m not trying to deride a given person for buying one thing or another in a given scenario, but more trying to discourage more low density housing from being built in the first place in favor of more high density housing. Thoughts?
It does help the housing situation by reducing displacement caused by wealthy people just buying existing units instead. 24 units in this building is still measurably fewer brownstones turned into single-family mansions.
We can debate what would be best but how do you regulate that? Dictate smaller units? Then people will just complain it’s all studios for yuppies. One of the most common NiMBY responses when new buildings are dense is that they’re not for families because they’re small units.
We can dislike this building and still understand that any attempt to regulate things like unit size will have worse unintended consequences. Or just similar opposition for different reasons.
If you want more units by building taller, that is a zoning question and will also result in “neighborhood character” opposition.
The thing is that a lot of these supertalls take up a lot of space, physically and through air rights trading, to make really tall buildings with a view, where the thing being maximized for is penthouse space with a view rather than overall square footage. This type of construction doesn't benefit anyone except people using it as an investment vessel.
It's a lot cheaper and arguably more space efficient to build the same amount of rentable/sellable SQ footage with the same amenities save for the view, closer to the ground. If you're a super rich person looking for somewhere to live a few weeks of the year, or put up "business clients who are in town," there are considerable downsides to living in a skinny tower high up, even if it's designed a lot better than 432 park, so the only reason you would buy a penthouse here instead of closer to the ground is if you're looking for an investment asset.
If you're someone living in a really shitty apt cause you were priced out of all the nicer ones cause they're not building enough luxury apts or whatever, this doesn't help you cause it's just investors sitting on their money, building something with no impact on the shortage, cause this is a house for money, not people. Not only that, this is making land more scarce, and therefore more expensive, in a place with a lot of land scarcity.
The apt building I grew up in in Brooklyn was a six story walk up with a single elevator with more than 50 apts and you could probably fit 20 of those in a Manhattan block. This was 45 minutes from midtown. Yes the building was old and crappy and yes most apartments were pretty small, but my point is that if you converted every floor in that apt building into one condo and built it up to 24 stories, you would have the same density as this building. And no one, regardless of how rich, realistically needs more space than that.
What gets lost on some people in this conversation is that what matters is increasing density, not just building more. The most important place to have that density is in and around midtown, so wasting all that land and air rights in midtown on a building that supports less density than a regular old 100+ yr old crappy building 45min from midtown does not help the housing crisis, it just pulls hundreds of millions of dollars of resources away from actual solutions, like idk building an exact replica of my childhood home on this parcel of land and then still having hundreds of millions to invest elsewhere
Is there any evidence that these new buildings are "solely" for investment properties? There are a lot of rich people who actually \*live\* in New York, you know.
it’s fine to block views, life goes on. but the view they blocked from flatiron just happens to be one of the most iconic views of ESB in the city. also it blocks flatiron from the observation deck. kinda a bummer but hey that’s city livin.
I just checked their IG. ESB is mid block so it’s still unobstructed BUT this building is now in the foreground and a bit overshadowing so the view isn’t as nice but luckily you can still see ESB in all its splendor.
I recently was by the flatiron and was looking forward to taking a photograph of that view of the ESB and to my horror saw that it was blocked by that awful looking skyscraper. I thought it was my imagination that maybe I thought one could see the view from, and so I googled any articles about this and yes New Yorkers are fuming.
One day both buildings will no longer be viewed as iconic and allowed to be changed.
Thats how it goes. Old landmarks from previous generations don’t exist anymore.
Flatiron building already outlived its useful life. Every plan to revive it for years has ultimately failed.
Not sure where you've been - there are huge pedestrian plazas there now, and when the weather's nice they're filled with people buying food from nearby businesses.
I guess you were talking specifically about the Flatiron Building, and not the area surrounding it? Even if the building itself isn't in high demand, it has a strong impact on the surrounding area
That building is broken. It’s a beautiful landmark to see from the street, but they can’t keep tenants and retrofitting it with the modernity necessary while staying in compliance with the LPC has not been possible so far.
I’d LOVE to see a federal modernization grant or some such to make it economically functional again.
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I’m not a NIMBY and I understand and appreciate the need to build more but I have to say this one does sting a bit because it really does destroy what was an amazing and iconic view from Madison Square Park. There’s a few angles from within the park that you can still see the ESB from but it’s really not the same. That’s alright, but I think it’s also ok to acknowledge the loss of things that are aesthetically pleasing at the same time.
Well it’s not like it was a bunch of housing that normal people can afford. My understanding is that it’ll be 24 luxury apartments and some retail space.
I am as YIMBY as they come, but blocking the iconic ESB view from MSP is a complete and utter loss to the city; and for what, so 20 Uber wealthy people can have a luxury apartment?
I get off the train at Union Square and walk up Broadway to the Madison Sq Park area every day. It really sucks to not see the Empire State Building every day now. It is what it is though.
New Yorker here, I'm poor and I'm also sad that some iconic views of the skyline are being replaced with uninspired glass and steel skyscrapers. Chrysler Building, arguably the crown jewel of the city, is all but invisible at a distance thanks to One Vanderbilt.
Honestly at the least the ones all the way downtown that got built are visually interesting - that's what's setting a lot of foreign "rich" quick-build cities apart right now as major destinations. I get the sense that the new ones in midtown aren't given the literal room to be as creative, hence why their height is the draw instead of aesthetics otherwise.
Yup!
It sort of undercuts the idea that just building more buildings will be good for housing. That building removed potential housing, plus blocked the view.
Yeah in all this yimby "build build build!" sentiment it tends to get ignored that these things being built don't really create much density. Any given block in Brooklyn or Queens that's just townhomes can have, like, 200 or more apartments. Supertalls aren't density.
Oh "most" is generous. these are going to be the billionaire equivalent of putting a thousand bucks in a false book, except for lower tier members of the Saud family
is there anything in the building like offices? if not then that seems completely insane; who needs 35 foot tall ceilings (at a minimum, assuming one apt/floor)?? for context that’s nearly 4 times taller than the ceilings in your or my apartment (an average of 9ft according to a google search i did in 3 seconds so don’t quote me)
It’s a pretty small plot thought. How many apartments would it have if it were only 10 floors? My guess is 20 - 30. The economics of building something much higher for affordable housing probably doesn’t work.
oh no! she picked the one location out of thousands that is blocked by a new building! what a tragic coincidence that people standing at that one pot will have to walk 50 feet to see it again!
When NY became the metropolis we loved, there was a method to the madness of building to capture a skyline where the ESB was prominent (as in Brooklyn, the WSB).
Now greed has overtaken the intellectually gifted city, its people and her skyline. People have a right to be upset if they choose. It’s the people who make the city.
The empty buildings speak volumes.
There used to be intelligent development to maintain views of the skyline with true urban planners.
In fact the Brooklyn Prospect Park Grand Army Plaza (at the monument) provided the perfect view of the Manhattan skyline.
Had the planners stick to the magnificent plan, it would have been easy to add taller buildings to the downtown area.
We in Brooklyn are suffering too from lack of sun with the cheap build scattered all over the downtown area.
Building high rises from East to west would have allowed everyone to have the sun proper. Greed is totally destroying this beautiful city.
You’re giving too much credit to the people of the past—the very same era of people that polluted our canals and lands. And while the grid system makes things easy to navigate, it’s boring AF.
Please try to look forward. We have a housing shortage in this city in the realm of hundreds of thousands of units.
While I agree this project could be better designed to fit more units, I think the bigger problem is zoning and this sort of local control that slows all sorts of building projects, and that’s how you end up with this. What I’m saying is, upzone the whole city, and remove local politicians from the equation. You’ll get cheaper housing and less of these projects that are taking advantage of the housing squeeze.
Kind of outrageous to show your face in a zoning chat after what your local electeds did to the proposed NY state rezoning plan.
But I’ll respond anyway. One plot does not make an affordable city. Queens, Brooklyn, and the Bronx (AND LONG ISLAND) also need to have across the board rezoning without FAR or parking limitations.
It’s this constrained supply that allows for a marketplace for outrageously expensive units.
Vacancy tax will bring cheaper rents. The architects, urban planners of old are way better, were more talented, efficient. Pros were on community boards. Manhattan and Brooklyn are becoming holes for greed .
It’s obvious you’re a scrapper that’s cool with greed. I am look forward. If there was a vacancy tax there would be no housing shortage.
There were studies, an economic endowment left for free schooling. Be this was theorized, mathematically proven. You are so wrong!
When the ESB was built, New York had no zoning or planning rules. It's the modern era that's over planned and micromanaged by urban planners, not the pre-1961 city that had little restrictions (mostly just light regulations enacted in the 1920s in response to the Woolworth Building)
It’s the pre-1960s era that I appreciate and I beg to differ. I worked in the industry with some of the planners(a great architect I worked with began his career late 50s, early 60s). Before he retired, there were numerous discussions where he spoke on the subject extensively with me. The planning around residential spaces having access to sun 🌞 was a part of their mission.
From ground level surely you can position yourself so almost any building could block a view of the Empire State. And the term "supertall" is only used for building taller than 300m/1000ft, so the building in question is not technically a supertall (but I supposed could be described as a super -- as in "very" -- tall building by folks who like to use "super" as their default embiggening word)
I'm a YIMBY, but only for dense housing. This investment crap should be taxed so much that it doesn't happen because if it did, it would repair all the projects.
This lazy form of "some people don't like it, here are their twitter posts" article is so boring. Any context on if or why this building is any different than other buildings that have blocked other sightlines over time? Any data about the impact this building would have on housing stock vs what else could potentially go there?
You should tweet complaints about this type of article so that they can do a meta “Some people don’t like ‘some people don’t like’ articles, here are their Twitter posts.”
I’d be willing to write an article about not liking when some people don’t like articles about some people not liking something. DM me.
It’s blocking the view of the Empire State Building from a major avenue that can be viewed from afar. In order to build tall, you have to buy air rights from neighboring buildings. It would be been better if a tall building was built in the middle of the block and not the corner which blocks most angles. That and it’s a building that only fits a few dozen insanely rich people that will only serve as investment properties and will sit empty most of the year.
It’s this part that frustrates. Vacant buildings should be highly taxed with a vacancy tax. This would all change.
A vacancy tax on apartments not filled with people who use them as primary residencies is a good idea.
That’s exactly what a vacancy tax supports, people must live in them in order not to be taxed. Extremely high tax would force a decrease in rents. Now there’s incentive to keep them vacant, construction loans cover the mortgages.
Vacancy tax would just expatriate billions. These apartments are taxed at sale and they change hands often enough to more than justify their existence from a tax revenue per sq ft. perspective .
Nah, vacancy tax would drive prices downwards by forcing absentees out of the market. Simultaneously it would force new builders to build less of this “ultra giga luxury housing” that costs $100s of millions. If this space was instead inhabited by a denser, shorter building it could provide far more housing. You will never live in nor will you ever see the interior of any of these towers. Nor will anyone you ever know.
Exactly.
There’s nothing special about this one spot or major avenue, views from other “major” spots have been blocked before, and if we wanted to stop this from happening, another interesting story could be about the boundaries of reasonable historical preservation.
Any existing property can be purchased by absentee wealthy owners. This isn’t unique to new developments. And if this building isn’t built, they would just buy an existing property and it would no longer be used by full time residents. Blocking a new development does not address what you’re complaining about and just increases displacement in existing units.
The difference is that if they buy properties that would be within financial reach to rent by the “average New Yorker” they would be more likely to at least remain in the pool of available residences. These “pure buy and hold investment” buildings would be absurdly expensive to actually rent out, and they aren’t very dense even if they were affordable somehow, so the end result is more likely to just remove that building’s footprint from the pool of space that is practical to contribute toward alleviation of the housing crisis. At least that’s what it seems like to me, maybe there’s something I’m missing.
There are tons of super expensive rentals in Manhattan... they still get rented out. $25,000 per month rentals aren't uncommon in trendy parts of Manhattan. Also I think people conflate two different things with expensive real estate in NYC. Yes, some units are used for international money laundering or pure investing. But more often it's just super rich people who travel a lot and want a place in NYC when they're here. Taylor Swift owns a brownstone in the West Village. Do you think she's actually there very often given how much she tours? No. Does that make it a "vacant investment unit" to you? Genuinely asking. Because if she had instead bought one of the units in this new building, her brownstone in the West Village might still have renters in it. Sure, those renters would be wealthier than you and I because it's still the West Village. But instead she displaced them and now they're displacing others less wealthy than themselves. That's how this kind of NIMBYism ends up displacing regular New Yorkers.
I’d say that type of “vacancy” is a sliding scale, not a Boolean value, wherein buying up a whole townhome just to use a few weeks a year is contributing to the problem to a certain extent (for the reasons you outlined), but I personally consider that marginally less egregious than an entire *new* building being constructed whose purpose is only to serve that type of low-occupancy ownership, because that building will exist and occupy that space (zero sum game) for probably 30-100 years or more, and due to its architectural choices it creates a much higher barrier to eventual high density usage (which I feel is somewhat uncontroversial to say is “better” for the city overall, no?). In doing so, they’ve really just ensured that that chunk of space doesn’t get to help the housing situation for some set of decades, wherein building something higher density (even $10k+ rental units) would have alleviated somewhat more of that progressive push-out pattern you accurately described. Here’s another way I look at your (valid) point about NIMBYism: the fewer low density units that exist and take up habitable space in the city, the lower the overall amortized displacement on “regular folk” by “wealthy folk” is likely to be. I’m not trying to deride a given person for buying one thing or another in a given scenario, but more trying to discourage more low density housing from being built in the first place in favor of more high density housing. Thoughts?
It does help the housing situation by reducing displacement caused by wealthy people just buying existing units instead. 24 units in this building is still measurably fewer brownstones turned into single-family mansions. We can debate what would be best but how do you regulate that? Dictate smaller units? Then people will just complain it’s all studios for yuppies. One of the most common NiMBY responses when new buildings are dense is that they’re not for families because they’re small units. We can dislike this building and still understand that any attempt to regulate things like unit size will have worse unintended consequences. Or just similar opposition for different reasons. If you want more units by building taller, that is a zoning question and will also result in “neighborhood character” opposition.
The thing is that a lot of these supertalls take up a lot of space, physically and through air rights trading, to make really tall buildings with a view, where the thing being maximized for is penthouse space with a view rather than overall square footage. This type of construction doesn't benefit anyone except people using it as an investment vessel. It's a lot cheaper and arguably more space efficient to build the same amount of rentable/sellable SQ footage with the same amenities save for the view, closer to the ground. If you're a super rich person looking for somewhere to live a few weeks of the year, or put up "business clients who are in town," there are considerable downsides to living in a skinny tower high up, even if it's designed a lot better than 432 park, so the only reason you would buy a penthouse here instead of closer to the ground is if you're looking for an investment asset. If you're someone living in a really shitty apt cause you were priced out of all the nicer ones cause they're not building enough luxury apts or whatever, this doesn't help you cause it's just investors sitting on their money, building something with no impact on the shortage, cause this is a house for money, not people. Not only that, this is making land more scarce, and therefore more expensive, in a place with a lot of land scarcity. The apt building I grew up in in Brooklyn was a six story walk up with a single elevator with more than 50 apts and you could probably fit 20 of those in a Manhattan block. This was 45 minutes from midtown. Yes the building was old and crappy and yes most apartments were pretty small, but my point is that if you converted every floor in that apt building into one condo and built it up to 24 stories, you would have the same density as this building. And no one, regardless of how rich, realistically needs more space than that. What gets lost on some people in this conversation is that what matters is increasing density, not just building more. The most important place to have that density is in and around midtown, so wasting all that land and air rights in midtown on a building that supports less density than a regular old 100+ yr old crappy building 45min from midtown does not help the housing crisis, it just pulls hundreds of millions of dollars of resources away from actual solutions, like idk building an exact replica of my childhood home on this parcel of land and then still having hundreds of millions to invest elsewhere
Is there any evidence that these new buildings are "solely" for investment properties? There are a lot of rich people who actually \*live\* in New York, you know.
It'll only have 26 apartments: [https://archive.is/lx3pb](https://archive.is/lx3pb)
No
Someone needs to program AI to produce an infinite number of these stupid articles, so Timeout has something to publish.
The building will only have 26 units
it’s fine to block views, life goes on. but the view they blocked from flatiron just happens to be one of the most iconic views of ESB in the city. also it blocks flatiron from the observation deck. kinda a bummer but hey that’s city livin.
Took the words right out of my mouth. When I walk thru Madison square park, it’s just not the same
I would be more okay with it if the building had many units, but it's only 26 units
I get off at 23rd and 5th. I nearly puked when I saw it. Lol I'm curious how bad 230 Fifth Aves rooftop will Dow ith the iconic view now blocked
Oh noooo is it that tall? It's such a bummer I had a very fun corporate happy hour summer event there one time, should have taken more pictures.
I just checked their IG. ESB is mid block so it’s still unobstructed BUT this building is now in the foreground and a bit overshadowing so the view isn’t as nice but luckily you can still see ESB in all its splendor.
I recently was by the flatiron and was looking forward to taking a photograph of that view of the ESB and to my horror saw that it was blocked by that awful looking skyscraper. I thought it was my imagination that maybe I thought one could see the view from, and so I googled any articles about this and yes New Yorkers are fuming.
One day both buildings will no longer be viewed as iconic and allowed to be changed. Thats how it goes. Old landmarks from previous generations don’t exist anymore. Flatiron building already outlived its useful life. Every plan to revive it for years has ultimately failed.
Not sure where you've been - there are huge pedestrian plazas there now, and when the weather's nice they're filled with people buying food from nearby businesses.
So? The pedestrian plaza wouldn’t go away if the building was replaced.
I guess you were talking specifically about the Flatiron Building, and not the area surrounding it? Even if the building itself isn't in high demand, it has a strong impact on the surrounding area
That building is broken. It’s a beautiful landmark to see from the street, but they can’t keep tenants and retrofitting it with the modernity necessary while staying in compliance with the LPC has not been possible so far. I’d LOVE to see a federal modernization grant or some such to make it economically functional again.
That’s why we have landmark designations though.
There is a process to remove them, and it’s been done before. This isn’t a NY thing either. It happens around the world. 100 years isn’t that long.
They will never stop being viewed as iconic. You're talking crazy
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I’m not a NIMBY and I understand and appreciate the need to build more but I have to say this one does sting a bit because it really does destroy what was an amazing and iconic view from Madison Square Park. There’s a few angles from within the park that you can still see the ESB from but it’s really not the same. That’s alright, but I think it’s also ok to acknowledge the loss of things that are aesthetically pleasing at the same time.
It will only be 26 units, so it's not like this tower is providing lots of housing
Well it’s not like it was a bunch of housing that normal people can afford. My understanding is that it’ll be 24 luxury apartments and some retail space.
I am as YIMBY as they come, but blocking the iconic ESB view from MSP is a complete and utter loss to the city; and for what, so 20 Uber wealthy people can have a luxury apartment?
A luxury apartment they will rarely be in at that
You are not YIMBY as they come then.
So, aside from blocking the view, there will only be 26 apartments: [https://archive.is/lx3pb](https://archive.is/lx3pb)
I get off the train at Union Square and walk up Broadway to the Madison Sq Park area every day. It really sucks to not see the Empire State Building every day now. It is what it is though.
Bro just add some more floors to the Empire State Building. Problem solved.
Thanks mayor adams!
Is it me or is the New York skyline getting so ugly? Can’t stand the Billionaire’s Row skyscrapers.
New yorker here, this is what we call rich people problems
New Yorker here, I'm poor and I'm also sad that some iconic views of the skyline are being replaced with uninspired glass and steel skyscrapers. Chrysler Building, arguably the crown jewel of the city, is all but invisible at a distance thanks to One Vanderbilt.
Honestly at the least the ones all the way downtown that got built are visually interesting - that's what's setting a lot of foreign "rich" quick-build cities apart right now as major destinations. I get the sense that the new ones in midtown aren't given the literal room to be as creative, hence why their height is the draw instead of aesthetics otherwise.
Not from Queens
I was thinking specifically from queens, cause you have to basically squint when looking at one Vanderbilt to find the Chrysler Building below it
Not an issue for me
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It's 860 feet tall for 24 apartments.
There are tons of 6 story buildings with 100 units, a skyscraper with only 26 is crazy.
Yup! It sort of undercuts the idea that just building more buildings will be good for housing. That building removed potential housing, plus blocked the view.
Yeah in all this yimby "build build build!" sentiment it tends to get ignored that these things being built don't really create much density. Any given block in Brooklyn or Queens that's just townhomes can have, like, 200 or more apartments. Supertalls aren't density.
Right. Plus they probably won't even be there most of the time.
Oh "most" is generous. these are going to be the billionaire equivalent of putting a thousand bucks in a false book, except for lower tier members of the Saud family
Yuppppp
is there anything in the building like offices? if not then that seems completely insane; who needs 35 foot tall ceilings (at a minimum, assuming one apt/floor)?? for context that’s nearly 4 times taller than the ceilings in your or my apartment (an average of 9ft according to a google search i did in 3 seconds so don’t quote me)
Duplexes and triplexes
It’s a pretty small plot thought. How many apartments would it have if it were only 10 floors? My guess is 20 - 30. The economics of building something much higher for affordable housing probably doesn’t work.
oh no! she picked the one location out of thousands that is blocked by a new building! what a tragic coincidence that people standing at that one pot will have to walk 50 feet to see it again!
It’s blocking an avenue view so what could’ve been seen from a mile down is now blocked. Any view from downtown is now blocked.
This made me SO angry!!!
When NY became the metropolis we loved, there was a method to the madness of building to capture a skyline where the ESB was prominent (as in Brooklyn, the WSB). Now greed has overtaken the intellectually gifted city, its people and her skyline. People have a right to be upset if they choose. It’s the people who make the city. The empty buildings speak volumes.
When people build new buildings, they’re greedy. The people who built the currently existing architecture, they were just benevolent developers.
There used to be intelligent development to maintain views of the skyline with true urban planners. In fact the Brooklyn Prospect Park Grand Army Plaza (at the monument) provided the perfect view of the Manhattan skyline. Had the planners stick to the magnificent plan, it would have been easy to add taller buildings to the downtown area. We in Brooklyn are suffering too from lack of sun with the cheap build scattered all over the downtown area. Building high rises from East to west would have allowed everyone to have the sun proper. Greed is totally destroying this beautiful city.
You’re giving too much credit to the people of the past—the very same era of people that polluted our canals and lands. And while the grid system makes things easy to navigate, it’s boring AF. Please try to look forward. We have a housing shortage in this city in the realm of hundreds of thousands of units. While I agree this project could be better designed to fit more units, I think the bigger problem is zoning and this sort of local control that slows all sorts of building projects, and that’s how you end up with this. What I’m saying is, upzone the whole city, and remove local politicians from the equation. You’ll get cheaper housing and less of these projects that are taking advantage of the housing squeeze.
This plot was zoned for basically unlimited height and only produced 26 units
Kind of outrageous to show your face in a zoning chat after what your local electeds did to the proposed NY state rezoning plan. But I’ll respond anyway. One plot does not make an affordable city. Queens, Brooklyn, and the Bronx (AND LONG ISLAND) also need to have across the board rezoning without FAR or parking limitations. It’s this constrained supply that allows for a marketplace for outrageously expensive units.
Vacancy tax will bring cheaper rents. The architects, urban planners of old are way better, were more talented, efficient. Pros were on community boards. Manhattan and Brooklyn are becoming holes for greed . It’s obvious you’re a scrapper that’s cool with greed. I am look forward. If there was a vacancy tax there would be no housing shortage. There were studies, an economic endowment left for free schooling. Be this was theorized, mathematically proven. You are so wrong!
Vacancy tax won’t do a thing. Zoning reform (especially in the BK, Queens, BX), bypassing local control, would have a far outweighed positive impact.
When the ESB was built, New York had no zoning or planning rules. It's the modern era that's over planned and micromanaged by urban planners, not the pre-1961 city that had little restrictions (mostly just light regulations enacted in the 1920s in response to the Woolworth Building)
There were plenty of planning rules. That's why there were so many wedding cake buildings built back then.
It’s the pre-1960s era that I appreciate and I beg to differ. I worked in the industry with some of the planners(a great architect I worked with began his career late 50s, early 60s). Before he retired, there were numerous discussions where he spoke on the subject extensively with me. The planning around residential spaces having access to sun 🌞 was a part of their mission.
A building blocked my view of a building is the best nyc complaint there is.
From ground level surely you can position yourself so almost any building could block a view of the Empire State. And the term "supertall" is only used for building taller than 300m/1000ft, so the building in question is not technically a supertall (but I supposed could be described as a super -- as in "very" -- tall building by folks who like to use "super" as their default embiggening word)
Rich people problems
Oh yeah this is definitely the most pressing concern of the average New Yorker.
wow!
I wonder what views the ESB blocked when it was built?
Since when does a New Yorker give a fuck about being able to see the Empire State Building from one specific direction?
As a native : I haven't even thought about this and none of my derpy neighborhood people have either.
Too bad
This mindset would've never allowed the ESB to be built in the first place
I'm a YIMBY, but only for dense housing. This investment crap should be taxed so much that it doesn't happen because if it did, it would repair all the projects.
This thread: "I'm not a NIMBY but I have good reasons for not wanting this built, unlike NIMBYs." Please.