City looks for developers to build Kips Bay biosciences center

455 First Avenue
455 First Avenue

The city’s Economic Development Corporation and Department of Mental Health and Hygiene are looking for developers to turn part of a Kips Bay building into a center for bioscience research.

The two agencies jointly issued a request for proposals Friday, seeking a developer to turn the 455 First Avenue space, located between 26th and 27th streets, into a facility that would house private research labs. There is currently a demand for increased lab space in the five boroughs, the city said, and the revamped building — owned by the city and located near Bellevue Hospital Center, NYU Langone Medical Center and the Alexandria Center for Life Sciences — would help meet that need, the city said in its announcement.

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The developer the EDC selects would redo the building’s entire structure, built in 1964, and could lease out unoccupied space to medical research tenants — leasing agreements the city would offer in lieu of paying for the cost of renovations.

The Health Department’s Public Health Laboratory, long located on 11 floors of the 335,000-square-foot building, would consolidate to six floors. The Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center and NYU occupy an additional three floors. [Crain’s]Julie Strickland