WeWork rolled out its big plans for a 16-story office building in the Brooklyn Navy Yard last summer. Now a smaller developer hopes to build a three-story office and retail project across the street from the yard and convert the hulking warehouse next door to office space.
Madison Realty Capital filed plans yesterday to erect the new building at 256 Flushing Avenue, on the corner of Ryerson Street. It would reach 47 feet into the air and hold 17,895 square feet of commercial space.
Retail and a lobby will fill the first floor, and offices will occupy the remaining two floors. There will also be a roof terrace and bike parking on the first floor.
Perkins Eastman applied for the permits. Their affiliate, S9 Architecture, is designing WeWork’s Dock 72 building in the Navy Yard.
Madison paid $45 million for the small garage at 256 Flushing and a vacant, eight-story factory next door at 29 Ryerson Street last year. The Midtown East-based firm filed applications yesterday to covert the 190,000-square-foot industrial building to offices. It would gain three stories, a roof deck, and 128 parking spots on the first two floors.
The blocks between the Brooklyn Queens Expressway and the Navy Yard are zoned exclusively for manufacturing and commercial development. The industrial zoning limits new construction to two- and three-story buildings, and most of the 19th century warehouses along Flushing Avenue are much larger than what could be built under modern zoning.
So very little development has happened along this traditional industrial corridor, which was once bustling with cold storage warehouses, wholesale grocery businesses, and bakeries. The only new construction happening next to the yard is Navy Green, a multi-building development with a mix of affordable and market-rate rentals, condos and townhouses. The city rezoned a full block for residential development to make way for the project back in 2009.
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Do you think more developement – commercial and residential around the new developments on flushing and Vanderbilt?