The owner of a building next to the proposed One Flushing affordable-housing project in Queens is suing the city and Monadnock Construction, claiming the 10-story building will rob him of his light and air easements.
Sam Yuan, who owns the three-story retail-and-office building at 40-48 Main Street, filed a lawsuit in Brooklyn Federal Court Wednesday naming Monadnock [TRDataCustom] and the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development as defendants.
Monadnock, according to the complaint, is expected to begin construction by the end of the year on the 232-unit all-affordable building set to rise on a former municipal parking lot at 133-45 41st Avenue next to The Flushing Main Street Long Island Rail Road station.
Yuan claims that when the project is complete, it will block his building’s light and air, and deny access tenants need to load and unload equipment. The landlord says he’s tried to negotiate with the city and the developer, who “have insisted that they would not cause alteration of the design of the project or even at least leave reasonable space to create a lane” between the development and his building.
Yuan is seeking compensation in an amount to be determined at trial, and asking the court to force the developers to alter the project in order to preserve his easements.
Representatives for Monadnock and HPD could not be immediately reached for comment.
The city selected Monadnock in April 2015 to develop the site along with the nonprofits Asian Americans for Equality and HANAC Inc.