Columbia gets court’s green light in Manhattanville eminent domain case

A rendering of Columbia’s Manhattanville campus

The New York Court of Appeals has upheld the state’s use of eminent domain to seize land for Columbia University’s proposed $6.3 billion, 17-acre West Harlem expansion plan, the Associated Press reported. The Empire State Development Corp. had argued that the seizures were justified because the area was blighted. The Columbia project, the agency said, would improve the neighborhood with new housing, laboratories and two acres of public open space. In December, that argument was rejected by a state appellate court, which said the general public would not benefit from the expansion of a private university. Columbia already owns all but 9 percent of the land it intends to build upon but wants the new Manhattanville campus to run uninterrupted with an interconnected underground facility beneath it. [AP] 

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