MTA Tests Rezoning Upside With Pacific Street Offering

The MTA is taking a swing at cashing in on Brooklyn’s latest rezoning wave, putting a long-overlooked Pacific Street parking lot on the block with residential upside baked in.

The agency issued an RFP for 1119 Pacific Street, a 30,000-square-foot site it has used for parking since 2009. The offering is straightforward — sell the land to fund the transit system’s capital program — but the real story is what changed: zoning. Until recently, the parcel was hemmed in by low-density commercial and industrial restrictions. Now it can support roughly 300 apartments.

That shift is the direct result of two overlapping policy moves: the Atlantic Avenue Mixed-Use Plan, approved last year, and the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity text amendment, passed in late 2024. Together, they’ve transformed a 21-block stretch of Brooklyn into one of the city’s more promising mid-scale housing frontiers with capacity for about 4,600 units.

On Pacific Street, there’s plenty of upside. The MTA is offering applicants the option to fold in 34,000 square feet of air rights from the adjacent Franklin Avenue Shuttle right-of-way. Thanks to City of Yes loosening transfer rules — eliminating the need for a special permit in cases like this — a developer could assemble a roughly 250,000-square-foot project with a relatively light lift from City Planning.

The project will still carry affordability strings. Under Mandatory Inclusionary Housing, at least 25 percent of units must be set aside for households earning an average of 60 percent of area median income. But the rezoning math appears to pencil: density bonuses, easier assemblages and potential transit-related incentives under the city’s Zoning for Transit Accessibility program all sweeten the deal.

For the MTA, the listing underscores a broader strategy of monetizing underutilized assets to self-fund more of its capital needs. For developers, it’s an early test case for whether City of Yes reforms can meaningfully accelerate production on public land.

More broadly, the site offers a preview of how rezonings are shifting value in outer-borough neighborhoods. What was once a marginal industrial parcel is now a viable residential play and potentially a tangible outcome of a rezoning push the city is betting will reshape its housing pipeline.

The last week of March brought a flurry of headlines in New York City real estate.

HPD pledges overhaul of housing lottery system

The city’s housing agency, HPD, plans to overhaul both its housing lottery system, Housing Connect, and its homeless placement system because “incremental fixes” are no longer considered sufficient.

The announcement follows recent rule changes made by the agency, including allowing owners to relist affordable housing units on sites like StreetEasy and Craigslist, and easing paperwork requirements for prospective tenants.

HPD Commissioner Dina Levy noted that the agency placed more than 10,000 households through Housing Connect and more than 4,600 households from city shelters last year.

Core Club’s fraud claims against Michael Shvo dismissed

A New York judge dismissed Core Club’s primary fraud claims against developer Michael Shvo.

The claims that survived include unjust enrichment and breach of agreement regarding the construction of a new Core Club location in New York.

The lawsuit is based on a failed 2022 agreement where Shvo allegedly reneged on his $100 million commitment to expand the club to San Francisco and Milan.

FiDi condo building changes hands in secret $93M sale

The 62-unit condo development at 1 Park Row in the Financial District was acquired by Grand Rapids, Michigan-based Eenhoorn from an entity tied to Circle F Capital for $93 million.

Circle F exited the project a year after launching condo sales.

The 23-story building features units averaging about 1,000 square feet and amenities such as a fitness center, garden terrace and lounge; a 3,300-square-foot duplex penthouse is listed for $50,000 per month.

After more than a century, Delmonico’s to open second location in Midtown

Finally, for the steak lovers: Delmonico’s is opening a 12,000-square-foot location at 1330 Sixth Avenue in Midtown.

The new restaurant, complementing the Financial District spot, is planned to open in Fall 2027.

Owner Dennis Turcinovic believes a Midtown location can capture business from corporate clients, tourism and the Central Park crowd. We’ll be waiting with forks and knives.