From left: RXR Realty’s 1330 Sixth Avenue, 601 West 26th Street and 340 Madison Avenue all have bike storage space

Amidst many obstacles, bike storage rooms are becoming more popular in New York City offices, according to the New York Times.

Office buildings including the Empire State Building, 520 Eighth Avenue, 345 Hudson Street, 1330 Sixth Avenue and 340 Madison Avenue have several hundred square feet of space for biking. RXR Realty, which owns the latter two properties, even has 1,800 square feet in its recently acquired Starrett-Lehigh building at 601 West 26th Street dedicated to bike storage for the 150 tenants that commute to work on two wheels each day. [more]

Twitter opened its first office in New York City at 340 Madison Avenue, between 43rd and 44th streets, this morning.

At its official East Coast headquarters in the 22-story building, the social media company will have 40 full-time employees, with plans to expand in the coming months, according to a press release from Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who officially opened the headquarters this morning with Jack Dorsey, Twitter’s chairman, and City Council Speaker Christine Quinn.

“We are proud to welcome Twitter to New York City’s growing technology sector,” said Bloomberg, whose own Twitter account @MikeBloomberg has 168,922 followers. “New York City has always been a place where big ideas are born, and we are working to ensure it’s the place where the next great tech success story is written — from incubating dozens of start-up ventures to bringing a new Applied Sciences school here. — Miranda Neubauer [more]

Scott Rechler, CEO of RXR Realty, and the Starrett-Lehigh Building

Scott Rechler’s RXR Realty this past Friday completed the purchase of the 2.3 million-square-foot office property in Chelsea, the Starrett-Lehigh Building at 601 West 26th Street, for $920 million, the company said in a news release this morning.

The 19-story building, built in 1932, was reported to be in contract in April after being brought to market by Eastdil Secured’s Doug Harmon and Adam Spies. It sold for about $400 per square foot. Tenants in the building include Martha Stuart-Omnimedia and clothing retailer Tommy Hilfiger. — Adam Pincus [more]

340 Madison Ave., RXR CEO Scott Rechler and 1330 Sixth Ave.

RXR Realty Chief Executive Scott Rechler may have employed a perfect strategy during the downturn, and he’s got the bank balance to prove it — a $1 billion-plus fund whose investors include Rothchild Realty and the Safira family, according to Crain’s. In the last year, RXR has used this fund to invest in over $3.5 billion in Manhattan properties, signing contracts for more than four million square feet of space.

The company’s first Manhattan purchase was the discounted debt on a 556,000-square-foot office condominium at 1166 Sixth Avenue. The firm is in contract to buy 40 percent of the condo, which is between 45th and 46th streets. [more]

It looks like 2010 is going to turn out to be another year when Canadian pension fund [more]

It looks like 2010 is going to turn out to be another year when Canadian pension fund [more]

RXR Realty has stepped up to the plate to buy Broadway Partners’ 23-story office tower at 340 Madison Avenue for roughly $570 million, or $760 a foot, according to the Post. Broadway purchased the 750,000-square-foot building, which was redeveloped in 2003 by Macklowe Properties, for $550 million four years ago, when it was only 40 percent leased. After a $50 million investment by Broadway, it is now 92 percent leased. Darcy Stacom and Bill Shanahan of CB Richard Ellis headed the marketing effort on the property. [more]

SL Green is buying Hines Interests’ 600 Lexington Avenue for almost $180 million, or $700 a square foot, sources told Crain’s. The 282,000-square-foot office tower is one of three major city properties of its kind that had been attracting attention from investors while on the market despite the sector’s slump. All three — the others are 340 Madison Avenue and 125 Park Avenue — are being marketed by Darcy Stacom and Bill Shanahan of CB Richard Ellis. The acquisition for the city’s largest landlord follows that of 100 Church Street, which SL Green picked up at a foreclosure auction earlier this year. The company also recently bought the debt on 510 Madison Avenue, on which a foreclosure is scheduled for next week pending a hearing tomorrow. [Crain’s]

With three large Manhattan commercial properties recently listed for sale, and another reportedly on its way to the block, prospective buyers are swirling and observers are wondering whether this is the beginning of a market comeback. Last month, Broadway Partners’ 340 Madison Avenue, the 740,000-square-foot office tower that has positive cash flow and is nearly 100 percent occupied, went on the market, and sources told Crain’s it is listed for about $700 per square foot. Joining 340 Madison Avenue on the market is the Helmsley Carlton House hotel at 680 Madison Avenue, which has apparently already drawn bids of $150 million-plus, and Hines Interests’ 600 Lexington Avenue, which went up for grabs last week. Shorenstein Properties is expected to begin shopping around its 125 Park Avenue office tower next week. Since none of these properties’ owners are desperate for cash, they could easily pull the buildings from the market if they don’t command what they view as a fair price, analysts say. Vulture investors have spent the last year building up war chests in the hopes that properties like these might eventually go up for sale, but whether investors and owners will be able to agree on pricing as the commercial market emerges from its crash remains to be seen. [Crain's]

Facebook has swapped its old office at 551 Fifth Avenue between 45th and 46th streets for a new 11,119-square-foot office space just a few blocks away, at 340 Madison Avenue between 43rd and 44th streets. A Facebook representative said that they moved for purely practical reasons. “As we expanded our team in New York, we simply outgrew our old space,” Meredith Chin, a Facebook spokesperson, said. Daniel Katcher of Newmark Knight Frank, who represented sublandlord Sunguard, described the space as “a nice mix between corporate, tech and loft offices” that will primarily house Facebook’s sales team. Broadway Partners purchased the 340 Madison Avenue building in 2006 for $550 million.