The Kingsbridge Armory redevelopment is on hold, but a Bronx landlord is moving ahead with large rent increases for retail tenants at a shopping center across the road from the planned $320 million ice skating complex at the armory. The 13 merchants say Levites Realty Management is raising rents 75 to 100 percent above current rates, putting many of them in danger of closing, the New York Daily News reported.
At the same time, Tamerlain Realty has listed the 19,000-square-foot plaza located at Jerome Avenue and Kingsbridge Road as being available for rental or redevelopment, according to the paper. The tenants, who say they have been without a lease for five years, have also been offered one-year rewewals, which they see as a prelude to being forced out, according to the Daily News.
“That type of letter is not a renewed-lease letter; it’s a put-people-out letter,” Christian Ramos, vice president of the Kingsbridge Road Merchants Association, told the newspaper. [NYDN] – Tom DiChristopher