NYC can’t resume indoor dining for the foreseeable future.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced today that indoor dining is barred indefinitely, Sasha Jones reports. Meanwhile, restaurants elsewhere in the state can operate at 50 percent capacity during phase three of reopening.
“We have not had the lack of compliance coupled with the lack of enforcement that we’ve had in New York City,” Cuomo said. “It’s much worse here.”
That was a dig at the mayor, who just last week said the city was on track to allow indoor dining July 6. The mayor changed his tune as other states reported upticks in coronavirus cases.
This means the city’s eateries will continue to rely on outdoor dining. And not all of NYC’s 27,000 restaurants have adapted well to the new normal.
“The longer neighborhood restaurants and bars are forced to be closed, the harder it will be for them to ever successfully reopen,” said Andrew Rigie, the executive director of the NYC Hospitality Alliance. “This makes it even more urgent to forgive rent, expand outdoor dining and enact other responsive policies to save our city’s beloved small businesses and jobs.”
Yikes. If you thought Manhattan office leasing during the first quarter was bad, brace yourselves.
Office leasing activity in the second quarter of 2020 totalled just 3.18 million square feet, according to Colliers International. That represents a 72(!) percent drop year-over-year and marked the slowest quarter since 2009, Kevin Sun reports.
The office market was hit hard during the worst of the pandemic (so far). The health of the office sector in NYC long-term, however, remains to be seen.
“Without a doubt, the second quarter of 2020 ranked as one of the most challenging periods in the history of the Manhattan office market,” Colliers senior managing director for New York research Franklin Wallach said in a statement. “However, Manhattan’s asking rent average was resilient, with only a slight decrease, while sublet supply has so far held firm. Nonetheless, any prolonged effects of the pandemic on the office market will be revealed over the next several quarters.”
What we’re thinking about: What are your weekend plans? Send a note/brag to kathryn@therealdeal.com.
CLOSING TIME
Residential: The priciest residential closing recorded Wednesday was for a two-family building at 152 West 88th Street on the Upper West Side, at $6.15 million.
Commercial: The most expensive commercial closing of the day was for an apartment building at 105-05 69th Avenue in Forest Hills, at $26.5 million.
BREAKING GROUND
The largest new building filing of the day was for a 11,731-square-foot, seven-family dwelling at 82-22 South Conduit Avenue in Howard Beach. Zois Sachtouris filed the permit application.
NEW TO THE MARKET
The priciest residential listing to hit the market was for a penthouse at 166 Duane Street in Tribeca, at $17.5 million. Douglas Elliman has the listing.
— Research by Orion Jones
A thing we’ve learned…
The Department of Buildings is hosting a contest dubbed the “Hack the Building Code” Innovation Challenge. The agency says it is looking for ideas from “forward-thinking design, construction, and development firms” on how to improve the city’s construction process. The winner gets to take over the department.
Just kidding. The winning proposal could be included in the city’s building code or agency guidelines laying out best practices. The winner will also be featured in DOB’s annual Build Safe/Live Safe Conference in September (read: free exposure). The deadline for submissions is Aug. 21. And if you want to tell me about your idea, I’m all ears!
Elsewhere in New York
— According to a report from the Center for New York City Affairs at The New School, NYC may end 2020 with 500,000 to 600,000 fewer jobs than it began the year with. Before the pandemic, the city had more than 4 million jobs, Gothamist reports.
— Mayor Bill de Blasio’s former lawyer is considering a bid to succeed him, Politico New York reports. Maya Wiley, a civil rights activist who chaired a police accountability board and is now a professor at The New School, may run next year. The news follows passage of the city’s 2021 budget, a process that may have hurt City Council Speaker Corey Johnson’s chances in that contest.
— New Jersey, Colorado and New Hampshire have for the first time legalized betting on the Nathan’s Hot Dog–Eating Contest, ESPN reports. “ESPN had already affirmed us as a sport in the early 2000s,” said Rich Shea, president of Major League Eating, which is apparently a thing. “But, with legal betting, we are really now as legitimate as the NFL and the NBA.”