Big U

City Selects Team To Design Lower Manhattan Section Of Flood Protection System

6:00 am on February 16, 2016 By Reid Wilson

In the wake of Superstorm Sandy in 2012 and the realization of rising sea levels, YIMBY, in 2013 and 2014, wrote on “Seaport City,” which was the Bloomberg administration’s ambitious proposal to mitigate flood waters in Lower Manhattan. But the city’s Economic Development Corporation is moving forward with another, less expensive plan, once dubbed the Big U and later the Dryline. The latest news concerns transforming the current shoreline from Harrison Street, in TriBeCa, to Montgomery Street, on the Lower East Side. This section would measure roughly 3.5 miles, and last week the city selected AECOM, who leads ONE Architecture and Bjarke Ingles Group (BIG), and Dewberry to officially design and engineer it, Crain’s reports.

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The Phantom Of Times Square: A Century Of Radical Change At 701 Seventh Avenue

4:15 pm on February 12, 2016 By Vitali Ogorodnikov

The year 2015 marked the near-complete demolition of Times Square’s second oldest structure. The Columbia Amusement Co. Building, which opened at Times Square’s northeast corner on West 47th Street in January 1910. 701 7th Avenue was known by a variety of names during its century-long life span. Like the slightly older yet much more famous One Times Square at the opposite end of the square, the building engaged in the neighborhood’s classic disappearing act, where giant billboards seen by millions made their renovation-scarred hosts all but invisible. But behind the ads, standing on a 16,000-square-foot lot, was a building with a history as dramatic and diverse as that of the famous square on which it stood.

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252 South Street

80-Story, 815-Unit Condominium Tower Rises Above Street Level At 252 South Street, Lower East Side

4:00 pm on February 12, 2016 By Reid Wilson

In October, complete renderings were revealed of Extell Development’s 80-story, 815-unit condominium tower at 252 South Street, in the Two Bridges section of the Lower East Side. At the time, foundation work was the main focus, but now the core of the tower is beginning to rise and is above street level, Bowery Boogie reports. The project is dubbed One Manhattan Square and being designed by Adam Associates. It will include 90,000 square feet of amenity space in total and a separate 13-story, 205-unit affordable residential building. There will also be roughly 20,000 square feet of retail space. Completion is expected in 2019.

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2213 65th Street

Six-Story, 10-Unit Mixed-Use Building Filed At 2213 65th Street, Mapleton

3:00 pm on February 12, 2016 By Reid Wilson

Brooklyn-based David Ogorek has filed applications for a six-story, 10-unit mixed-use building at 2213 65th Street, in Mapleton, located a block from the Bay Parkway stop on the N train. The project will encompass 16,033 square feet and will include 2,000 square feet of commercial space on the ground floor for retail and offices. Residential units will begin on the second floor and should average a relatively spacious 1,000 square feet apiece. Manuel Pereiras’ Union City, New Jersey-based Pereiras Architects Ubiquitous is the architect of record. The 40-foot-wide site is currently home to a single-story restaurant.

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