The site at 37-29 33rd Street is cleared and ready for construction of a six-story mixed-use building, part of construction wave transforming Long Island City’s Dutch Kills neighborhood. The development by Saviour Sultana and general…
2015 marked the 50th anniversary of the New York City landmarks law. There were occasions to celebrate, and the Landmarks Preservation Commission designated six individual landmarks and four historic districts. 2016 was considerably busier for the commission. It designated 40 individual landmarks and two historic districts, including 12 new Midtown East landmarks and 26 sites from its backlog. Here are all of them, for you to take in as the year comes to a close.
In April 2014 we interviewed developer Sam Charney of Charney Construction and Development. Among other things, he spoke about Long Island City’s 11-51 47th Avenue, now known as the Jackson. Since then, we have followed the building’s progress, starting when the site was cleared at the end of 2015 up until its recent topping-out. Today we revisit the project with Charney and the building’s architect, Chris Fogarty of Fogarty Finger.
When YIMBY last reported on the residential building at 41-04 27th Street in northern Long Island City, at the end of June, it was noted that the nine-story project reached its topmost point. In the two months that have passed, the concrete frame has been sheathed in a curtain wall that looks ready to receive its panel cladding. The 32-unit property, developed by Great Stone Development and designed by Tan Architect, stands at the intersection of 27th Street and 41st Avenue. In conjunction with its equally-new neighbors, the building scale makes for an appropriate transition between the dense skyscraper district of Court Square to the south, and the traditional, rowhome-lined blocks of Dutch Kills to the north.
The cores of dense cities work best when they mix a variety of functions, such as residential, commercial, or office. This mixing allows for a round-the-clock pedestrian presence, ensuring that the streets do not empty out at any point of the day. The concept is taken literally to the next level when two independent functions are stacked one on top of another within the same building, like roommates sharing a bunk bed. This effectively puts two buildings on the same plot without resorting to narrow towers with small floorplates. Although generally rare, mixed-use skyscrapers have made their mark upon Manhattan, starting with the famed Waldorf-Astoria, which combined hotel rooms at the bottom with apartments on top in 1931. Now, the city’s first major mixed-use tower has risen outside of Manhattan. The 31-story, glass-and-concrete slab at 29-11 Queens Plaza North in Long Island City, has seen construction virtually wrapped up at the time of this writing. Its lower 15 floors house the Marriott Courtyard Long Island City hotel, with the 135-unit residential complex called the Aurora sitting on the floors above.