Starting next year, you might want to take your hardhat if you’re walking around the Upper West Side between 59th and 72nd streets.
A huge construction boom is slated for the area between Lincoln Center and the Hudson River, with more than a dozen developments planned or proposed for the next two years. The slew of projects will include billions of dollars in new construction and thousands of new apartments, transforming the neighborhood skyline.
Residents fear the change will be traumatic.
“If you look at the limited area,” says Betya Lewton, president of the Coalition for a Livable West Side, which is tracking the projects in the area, “even besides the Lincoln Center work starting in 2006, and look at all the projects that have already started and those scheduled to begin in 2006 the traffic, the trucks, the noise and air pollution, the rats running wild it’s really terrible.”
To real estate professionals, on the other hand, it’s a revelation.
Mark Ripka, West Side brokerage manager for Sotheby’s International Realty, says the far West Side “will become a neighborhood onto itself.”
“It builds on the momentum built up by the Time Warner Center,” he says, adding that comparatively less expensive prices could draw families and empty nesters looking for a reasonable pied-a-terre near Lincoln Center.
Klara Madlin, owner of Klara Madlin Real Estate, said she expects a mixture of condos and rentals. While heights of several buildings and details on adding new roads and transportation are unresolved at the government level, “It’s inevitable these projects are going to be built,” she says.
Here is a sampling of some of the projects scheduled for the Upper West Side.
1. West 69th-70th streets at West End Avenue
Developer American Continental Properties is presenting plans before the local community board to construct two buildings at this site, one at 26 stories and the other at 15 stories.
2. West 67th-69th streets at Amsterdam Avenue
American Continental Properties is reportedly in negotiation with two synagogues to buy air rights that would enable them to build a tower as high as 70 stories. Without the rights, the building they propose for this site would be limited to 21 stories.
3. Residential Tower/NYC Opera Hall, West 66th Street and Amsterdam Avenue
Developer A. & R. Kalimian Realty is negotiating with the New York City Opera regarding a plan to create new quarters for the Opera in a residential tower near its present home at Lincoln Center. The builder bought the site, which contained the former Red Cross New York headquarters, a year ago for $70 million. While the site is not zoned for a tall building, air rights could be obtained from either Lincoln Center or the Martin Luther King Jr. High School. The project needs approval from the New York City Planning Commission and other city agencies.
4. Senior Citizen Housing, 33 West End Avenue at West 61st Street
Atlantic Development Group is building a 13-story subsidized senior citizen facility with an entrance on West 61st Street. Residents, 50 percent of whom will be from the area, will be chosen by lottery. The building is entirely inclusionary housing and will be managed by the Metropolitan New York Coordinating Council on Jewish Poverty. The project includes 8,400 square feet of retail space.
5. Freedom Place South and West 61st Street
A 211-unit rental building is under construction on a newly created street at Riverside South, west of West End Towers.
6. 10 West End Avenue between West 59th and 60th streets
Ten West End Avenue Development is building a 31-story tower with 300 condominium apartments.
7. 1 West End Avenue, between 59th and 60th streets
25-story project which will have half of its 211 units rented to people with lower incomes.
8. John Jay College Expansion, 11th Avenue, between 58th and 59th streets
The college is planning a 620,000-square-foot project to expand its campus adjacent to its existing Haaren Hall.
9. West 59th-60th streets, between West End and Amsterdam avenues
Moshe Dan Azogui’s Brack Capital and Continental Equities are planning a 35-story residential tower on the 1-acre site. The ultra-luxury building would contain indoor and outdoor swimming pools, basketball and tennis courts.
10. 245 West 60th Street, between Amsterdam and West End avenues
Laurence Ginsberg’s LHL Realty Co. plans to build two residential towers with 30 and 15 stories, containing up to 515 units, pending rezoning permits and an environmental impact statement. The project would include parking for 185 cars and might be eligible for a 20 percent inclusionary housing bonus.
11. 225 West 60th Street between West End and Amsterdam avenues
The Touro College for Women will occupy five floors, from the cellar to the third floor, at the base of a 20-story tower. The remainder of the building will contain 80 apartments, including 59 one-bedrooms, 24 two-bedrooms and a mix of three-bedrooms. The college will include a double-height gym, library, cafeteria, three laboratories, 17 classrooms, administrative, faculty and student offices, and a terrace accessible from the second floor.
12. Fordham University Expansion, West 60th-62nd streets, between Amsterdam and Columbus avenues
As part of an expansion that would more than double the size of its Lincoln Center campus and reshape that section of the Upper West Side, Fordham University has submitted plans that include a 47-story apartment building and a 26-story dormitory at 60th Street and a 57-story apartment building at 62nd Street. In the $300 million first phase of construction, over the next six years or so, the university would build a 16-story law school and five-story campus center and expand its library to eight stories. The second phase, which would roll out through 2025, includes a 21-story dormitory and two buildings of 35 and 36 stories on Columbus Avenue to accommodate university programs.
13. Fifteen Central Park West, West 61st-62nd streets, between Broadway and CPW
Plans were announced last month for the nearly 60,000-square-foot vacant lot left by the demolition of the Mayflower Hotel. Zeckendorf Development will construct a luxury condominium consisting of two wings The House, at 20 stories and The Tower, at 43 stories. Designed in a neo-classical style by Robert A.M. Stern and clad in Indiana limestone, the project will offer 202 apartments, including terraced duplexes and full-floor penthouses, plus 29 private suites that may be purchased by residents for their guests or staff. Ninety percent of the units will have direct Central Park views. The building is scheduled for occupancy in spring 2007.
14. Radisson / Empire Hotel, West 62nd-63rd streets, between Broadway and Columbus
While no plans have been submitted, the hotel reportedly will be demolished when the last rent stabilized tenant vacates. A new residential project will be built on the site. Special Lincoln Square zoning limits the height to about 31 stories. The new building could qualify for a 20-percent inclusionary housing bonus, which permits the developer to build bigger than zoning allows in exchange for the inclusion of a number of affordable units.
15. Lincoln Center Redevelopment
Lincoln Center’s $325 million revitalization will transform the look and feel of the cultural center and its surrounding area. The construction plan includes new street-level entrances and facades, dramatic lighting and modernist theater marquees; expansion and landscaping of the North Plaza; expansion of the Julliard School; an upgrade of Alice Tully Hall; a new Film Society complex with two screening rooms and a lecture hall; a new entrance to the Vivian Beaumont and Mitzi Newhouse theatres; and new pedestrian walkways and escalators connecting the Rose Building and Julliard.