From left: St. Vincent's Hospital and Bill Rudin, managing partner at Rudin Management
As predicted, Rudin Management has made a number of concessions in its bid to build luxury apartments on the former St. Vincent’s hospital site, including a reduction of the number of units planned, from 450 to 350, DNAinfo reported. The City Council’s land use committee hashed out the agreement with Rudin today, according to a statement from the City Council, DNAinfo said. [more]
Fudin Management Managing Partner William Rudin and the proposed St. Vincent's development
Opponents and supporters of the proposed luxury condominium development on the former site of St. Vincent’s Hospital by Rudin Management flooded a City Council room at 250 Broadway at 9:30 this morning. They were there to have their say in what was the final public hearing the City Council will hold before deciding the fate of the rezoning of the St. Vincent’s East Campus for the project. [more]
City Council Speaker Quinn
Rudin Management will likely agree to last minute concessions in order to push through its bid to build 450 luxury condominiums on the former St. Vincent’s Hospital site in the West Village, Crain’s reported, but affordable housing will not be included in the deal.
Sources told Crain’s that City Council Speaker Christine Quinn will “extract a few last extras from Rudin worth millions of dollars,” including a compromise of some sort regarding a public park on the site. Rudin is also expected to provide funding for local public schools. [more]
St. Vincent's hospital
The City Planning Commission approved a luxury condominium development on the former site of St. Vincent’s Hospital, WNYC reported.
Developer Rudin Management requested the green light to build 450 condominiums and 11,000 square feet of retail space at the St. Vincent’s site at Seventh Avenue and Greenwich Avenue in Greenwich Village. The local community board and several groups opposed the project, saying it would be out of character with the neighborhood. [more]
Clockwise from top left: Rudin Management CEO Bill Rudin, One Battery Park Plaza and Rose Associates Chairman Daniel Rose
The Rudin family has bought out the Rose family’s 50 percent stake in One Battery Park Plaza for $80 million and taken complete control of the downtown office tower, the New York Post reported.
The transaction illustrates the diverging directions of the two families and their firms, Rose Associates and Rudin Management. While Rudin has worked to solidify its stake in the office market downtown, where the firm owns about 3 million square feet, Rose Associates has focused on residential properties. [more]
Developer William Rudin said the “economics” of his company’s $1 billion conversion of the St. Vincent’s hospital campus into a 450-unit luxury residential development could not support affordable housing, as he came under fire from community officials for not doing enough to justify a requested rezoning of the Greenwich Village site.
Rudin, the CEO of Rudin Management, appeared today at the first public hearing in the uniform land use review procedure, or ULURP, to decide whether the developer can proceed with the controversial project, already four years in the making. [more]
Community Board 2 in Greenwich Village last night voted against a proposal to turn the former site of St. Vincent’s hospital into an emergency medical facility, luxury homes and retail, DNAinfo reported.
The board voted to urge the city to deny a bid to rezone the site in Greenwich Village unless the developers, Rudin Management, meet a number of requirements.
Among the board’s concerns are a possible jump in neighborhood density as a result of the proposed 450 residential units, as well as increased traffic that could result from the parking garage proposed for West 12th Street.
[more]
Supporters of the Occupy Wall Street movement have now begun targeting the Real Estate Board of New York on social media and then in turn by phone, following news reports that REBNY seeks to submit a proposal to the city limiting the public access hours of privately owned public parks. In response to an opinion article in today’s New York Times by Jerold Kayden, a professor of urban planning at Harvard University, on the legal gray area of such privately owned public spaces, and the news reports of REBNY’s plans, a Twitter user called @OccupyMyCat this morning posted, “Announcement! It’s time to Occupy REBNY, the Real Estate Board of New York!”
Following the controversy surrounding the Occupy Wall Street movement’s ongoing presence in Zuccotti Park, which is owned by Brookfield Properties but is open to the public, new signs forbidding camping have gone up at similar parks in Midtown owned by Brookfield and Rudin Management, the New York Times reported.
The signs have gone up at Grace Plaza, next to the W. R. Grace Building at 43rd Street and Sixth Avenue, owned by Brookfield, and plazas attached to 40 East 52nd Street and 345 Park Avenue, owned by Rudin.
A woman who answered the phone at Rudin told the Times that there was a connection between the protests and the new signs.
“Sure it has a lot to do with it,” the woman, who was not named, said.
Brookfield declined to comment. [more]
William Rudin and the St. Vincent’s Hospital siteThe Rudin family’s $800 million redevelopment of the St. Vincent’s Hospital site is one step closer to a reality. According to the Wall Street Journal, Rudin Management obtained $525 million in construction financing and can begin construction once the government approval process, already underway, is complete.
The relative ease with which the Rudin’s cleared the financing obstacle given today’s tight lending environment was surprising, the Journal said. Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of New York Mellon and M&T Bank contributed to the loan.
But that last hurdle, government approval, could be the highest. [more]
