Hunts Point produce vendors threaten to leave

The market at Hunts Point

The fruit and vegetable merchants that occupy the run-down Terminal Produce Cooperative Market at Hunts Point in the South Bronx are threatening to leave the city-owned facility — the largest of its kind in the world — after a push by a regulator to impose new rules and increase fees, according to Crain’s. The 46 vendors, who together supply 60 percent of the city’s produce, have long endured poor conditions and overcrowding at the 112-acre property, which they say is the reason they’ve lost many of their customers to wholesalers. A $320 million modern market for the site is currently in the planning stages, but rents at the new facility are still up in the air, pending negotiations and also depending on how much funding the city, state and federal governments decide to contribute to the project. Meanwhile, pushed to their limit by the regulator’s more stringent rules, the merchants have tapped Jones Lang LaSalle to help them look into relocating altogether, possibly to New Jersey, when their lease expires in 10 months. [Crain’s]

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