On October 17, 2019, the City Council approved a plan to replace Rikers Island. A month earlier, Allen P. Cappelli, a member of the City Planning Commission, had voted with the 9-3 majority in favor of the application. Cappelli called Rikers Island an “absolute abomination” and in need of “shuttering.” Cappelli’s vote reflected four decades of public service.
The modified design addressed concerns raised at the Landmarks public hearing. On November 12, 2019, the Landmarks Preservation Commission voted to approve a certificate of appropriateness to demolish an existing one and a half-story commercial brick building and construct a new seven-story residential and commercial use building with an elevated mechanical bulkhead at 31 Lispenard Street, Manhattan. At the September 17th public hearing, Landmarks had concerns about the proposed design and asked the applicants … <Read More>
The applicants and Landmarks staff will work together to modify details for the proposed building. On December 3, 2019, the Landmarks Preservation Commission voted to approve a certificate of appropriateness to construct a new three-story residential building on a vacant lot at 324 Macon Street, Brooklyn, located within the Bedford Stuyvesant/Expanded Stuyvesant Heights Historic District.
The landmarked building featured many late Gothic details. On December 10, 2019, the Landmarks Preservation Commission voted to rescind the individual landmark designation of a vacant lot, located at 425 Grand Concourse, Bronx. The lot was formerly the location of Public School 31, which was demolished in 2015.
The development will bring 503 permanent housing units, both affordable and supportive, to East New York. On December 10, 2019, the City Council approved a land use application for the development of four mixed-use buildings to replace a three-story homeless shelter at 515 Blake Avenue in East New York, Brooklyn. The buildings will be a combination of residential use, commercial use, and community facilities. The land use application, submitted by the Department of Housing Preservation … <Read More>
The 1.5 acre stretch of open space, to be completed by 2022, is part of the Manhattan Waterfront Greenway initiative to create continuous loop around perimeter of Manhattan. On November 22, 2019, Mayor Bill de Blasio and top agency officials celebrated the commencement of construction of a new waterfront public open space, the East Midtown Greenway, which will stretch between East 53rd Street to East 61st Street. The East Midtown Greenway project … <Read More>