New Penn Station (Moynihan Station)

[scumonkey]

From todays Post:
http://www.nypost.com/seven/09212007/news/regionalnews/tower_play_at_farley_station.htm

[Dynamicdezzy]

What I'm wondering is, will this make for a grandeur station? And/or will this mean a bunch of "eh" towers all around the west side and no TALL towers near this station...

[MikeW]

One thing that's been unclear about the entire Moynahan Station project. Are the moving the entire station to the Farley building, or just Amtrak? I seem to remember hearing a while back that it was just Amtrak.

[londonlawyer]

From todays Post:
http://www.nypost.com/seven/09212007/news/regionalnews/tower_play_at_farley_station.htm

I hope this means that the disgusting corners of 34th and 7th (southeast corner) and 34th and 8th (northeast corner) will be razed and redeveloped. I wonder if MSG still will move.

[krulltime]

I rather have two very tall towers than spreading everything around. That area around can be developed in the future, with much smaller towers for all I care. (The again, I will first like to see what the tall towers will look like. If they look great then built them, if not, then spread the whole thing.

[BrooklynRider]

Foye told members of the New York Building Congress that shifting the office space proposed for the two towers to sites around Penn Station "will mean less disruption to commuters, fewer financial risks, and [b]it will tie the development around Moynihan Station to the demands of the market."

This is an odd statement. Would the development otherwise NOT be tied to the demands of the market?

[sfenn1117]

I don't mind spreading around the development rights. Think about it; two huge towers on the site would still be a decade away. This way, the development rights get used quicker, and potentially 15-20 years from now when this project finally starts, there will be an office demand and big towers may still be allowed on this site.

Dreaming a little, but realistic at the same time.

[fioco]

I infer that the air-rights will be transferred to properties in the area, and the developers can decide when to utilize them depending on market conditions. Supertalls are riskier investments. Look for the Midtown plateau to move west/southwest with incredible density.

[STT757]

One thing that's been unclear about the entire Moynahan Station project. Are the moving the entire station to the Farley building, or just Amtrak? I seem to remember hearing a while back that it was just Amtrak.

Amtrak did not want to move to Farley, they own the basement they are in now. If they moved to Farley they would have to pay rent, they refused. Farley will be almost exclusively for NJ Transit, they signed a lease for space.

[macreator]

Amtrak did not want to move to Farley, they own the basement they are in now. If they moved to Farley they would have to pay rent, they refused. Farley will be almost exclusively for NJ Transit, they signed a lease for space.

I believe Amtrak has reversed their position though as of late.

I'm disappointed that the state doesn't want to pursue having two supertall signature tower. I'm all for spreading development throughout the district, but I'm not exactly happy at the prospect of the Midtown 700-800 foot plateau moving further south and westward.

[Derek2k3]

I don't like the idea of just building a giant mall surrounding a train station at the the MSG site. Either build the 1300' skyscrapers or just have a spectacular stand alone-train station surrounded by a Bryant Park-type green space. Have retail and skyscrapers surround that. There is very little public space in the area. One problem with this idea is that they're not getting rid of 15 Penn.

[scumonkey]

Amen!

[STT757]

I believe Amtrak has reversed their position though as of late.

Why would they, Amtrak pays nothing now for the space they own. Why would they move only to have to have to start paying rent, and who would buy their space they occupy now? Amtrak is not going to move if they think this redevelopment of the existing Penn Station thanks to the developers is actually going to happen.

It's NJ Transit, and perhaps Metro North if they begin service to Penn Station from the New Haven and Hudson Lines as planned.

[lofter1]

Why would AMTRAK do anything?

Because AMTRAK depends on government funds to survive. So sometimes they have to make nice and try to play well with others.

[Citytect]

Here is a quote (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showpost.php?p=180266&postcount=1651) from the New York Times regarding Amtrak and the possibility that they might want to move to Moynihan after all:


August 4, 2007

Complications Hindering Moynihan Station Plans

By CHARLES V. BAGLI

...

Amtrak has insisted in recent meetings with the developers and other transportation agencies that it has veto power over plans to build a new station because it owns Penn Station and the property below Madison Square Garden. Amtrak executives have also said that the railroad is considering moving its operations from Penn Station to the James A. Farley Post Office building, a move that could force out the anchor tenant, New Jersey Transit, or require a major realignment of space.

The developers were taken aback by Amtrak’s seemingly new position, which comes afte r more than a year of planning and dozens of meetings with New Jersey Transit, the Long Island Rail Road, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and Amtrak, according to government officials and real estate executives...

[macreator]

Here is a quote (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showpost.php?p=180266&postcount=1651) from the New York Times regarding Amtrak and the possibility that they might want to move to Moynihan after all:

I knew I wasn't pulling that bit of info out of thin air. Thanks Citytect for finding that article.

[STT757]

Why would AMTRAK do anything?

Because AMTRAK depends on government funds to survive. So sometimes they have to make nice and try to play well with others.

Also keep in mind that Amtrak back only 2-3 years ago during a cash shortage mortgaged their space at NY Penn for cash, and now they are stuck until they pay that back. Again I don't see why they would move when they would have to pay rent in the new space as well as mortgage payments on their current space.

[TonyO]

The plans have a "Moynihan East" (Penn Station) and "Moynihan West" (Farley), with East being planned for Amtrak's stay. While the 8/4 Times article points to possible reconsideration by Amtrak with regards to staying put, there's no incentive for them to move. As it has been stated, they own the land in Penn Station (mortgaged or not) and any move would likely erase any windfall from leasing the space to NJ Transit or whomever.

I think Amtrak will stay put.

[Ebola]

Are the two main towers of this plan officially dead yet?
:(
We never even saw renderings... and I hear Foster was in on the towers... those asses upstate should be murdered.

[Dynamicdezzy]

The developers are the ones who would rather build all around the area.

[Ebola]

Now, I'm no city planner, but wouldn't building a lot small buildings all around the area significantly increase congestion? It seems so inefficient. Sure, building several 90+ story supertalls will make the area a nightmare for a few years, and there may be fiscal problems, but in the long term, creating more space via extremely tall buildings is almost always the best option for cities like NY, Hong Kong, and Tokyo. Now that Manhattan Island is almost out of space, what we build now will have a major impact on our future. Was the WTC a failure? Mega buildings like the old and New WTC serve as a city inside of a city; I hope that we see more projects like that.

[ZippyTheChimp]

^
The space being added to the area is the total amount of the air-rights, so it doesn't make a difference.

I suspect the developers have lobbied for the change, since building over an active railroad hub is more expensive than off-site. Since it is now known that they are lobbying for a federal contribution to the Penn Station renovation, it seems they want nothing to do with the station, just the air-rights.

Typical crap.

[MikeW]

What about the LIRR?

If this is just for NJ transit, with Amwreck and the LIRR still in the 'old' Penn Station, is this whole exercise really worth it?


Amtrak did not want to move to Farley, they own the basement they are in now. If they moved to Farley they would have to pay rent, they refused. Farley will be almost exclusively for NJ Transit, they signed a lease for space.

[ZippyTheChimp]

^
The Penn Station renovation includes both the Farley Building (sometimes referred to as Penn Station West) and the existing Penn Station under MSG.

[Dynamicdezzy]

JUMP THE FAST TRACK TO PENN
By TOM TOPOUSIS
October 2, 2007 -- One of the bids to develop the West Side rail yards will propose an elevated "people mover" to get residents and office workers in the new development to and from Penn Station, The Post has learned.

Engineers for the Durst Organization are developing plans for the automated light rail line that would connect the now isolated rail yards to the city's largest transit hub.

"It would create a direct link with Penn Station and it would complement the 7 train," Durst spokesman Jordan Barowitz said of the people mover and its ability to link to a planned extension of the No. 7 subway line to 11th Avenue and 34th Street.

Barowitz said the cost of a people mover has yet to be calculated. It would be operated by the developer and not the MTA.

The fully automated people mover would be able to carry 20,000 passengers per hour. It would take one minute to travel from Penn Station to 11th Avenue and 33rd Street.

Durst is among four or five of the city's biggest developers who are expected to submit bids to build housing, office towers and park space over the 26 acres of the MTA's West Side rail yards, by far the largest tract of developable land in Manhattan.

The deadline to file bids is Oct. 11.

tom.topousis@nypost.com

[Ninjahedge]

building over an active railroad hub is more expensive than off-site.

Bingo.

It is a matter of what parts they can or will use in the new construction. You have this whole thing that is there now, an existing "basement" (3 levels) on top of an old set of rail tracks and platforms. You have the foundations from them, the columns that supported the old system/structure and the new coulmns and foundations they put in for that round monstrocity.

So, what steel do you leave? What steel needs to be removed? Will the existing foundations, both new and old, be able to hold a 5, 10 or 20 story building on it? If so, how?

We will probably see shortly what they consider to be feasable. That will not tell us what they will do, but it will most likely tell us what they won't.

[antinimby]

That's wonderful! In private hands, you know it's more likely to get done.

[lofter1]

... propose an elevated "people mover" to get residents and office workers in the new development to and from Penn Station ...

... the cost of a people mover has yet to be calculated. It would be operated by the developer and not the MTA.

The fully automated people mover would be able to carry 20,000 passengers per hour ... one minute to travel from Penn Station to 11th Avenue and 33rd Street.

Would one be naive to assume that such above-ground transport would be free of charge?

Not sure how many folks coming off a commuter line (or subway) and out of Penn Station would be willing to cough up $1 / $2 for the single destination ride.

:confused:

[Dynamicdezzy]

^I'm also wondering if this people mover would be along the street, or even better yet running 1 floor above from building to building. But yeah, I'm hoping it would be a free ride.

By the way Lofter, I'm glad to see you changed your "face" is back to way it was. I'm like "who the f*ck is this guy?" when you changed your avatar. lol

[lofter1]

Yeah ^^ the new avatars got lots of flack. :confused:

Personally, I've once again turned on the "Don't Show Avatar" option ;)

[Eugenious]

I highly urge people to stop by Farley and check out the newly cleaned up facade before it gets dirty again. On a nice day like today looks almost white.

[Ninjahedge]

Ironic that the guy that most have associated with his Avatar (because of his posting proliferance) is not keen on the idea of seeing them himself.

;)


As for the mover, I am wondering how you can move people the 1-2 blocks in 1 minute...

I am betting this is the "doors closed to doors open" time, not including loading or any other delays.....

[Dynamicdezzy]

I wonder whether having the 42nd street light rail would have been more efficient. Or would it compliment the above (people mover AND 7 train) or be redundant?

[lofter1]

I highly urge people to stop by Farley and check out the newly cleaned up facade ...

It looks magnificent -- in no small part because they have removed those big ugly lights that used to hang off the facade -- they've replaced them with much smaller and far more discrete fixtures (although the big ones are still hanging above the facade on the side streets) ...

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p242/Lofter1/MSG%20Farley/Farley_02b.jpg

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p242/Lofter1/MSG%20Farley/Farley_02h.jpg

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p242/Lofter1/MSG%20Farley/Farley_02j.jpg

And whether you've got letters to mail or not: be sure to check out the Lobby above Eighth Avenue ...

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p242/Lofter1/MSG%20Farley/Farley_01a_Int.jpg

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p242/Lofter1/MSG%20Farley/Farley_01c_Int.jpg

***

[NYguy]

^ Nice

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601088&sid=a9BUMb3MxM0U&refer=muse

Penn Station Project Needs Real Debate to Produce Great Design

By James S. Russell
Oct. 11 (Bloomberg)


Imagine coming into a new Penn Station under a graceful glass canopy, descending on roomy escalators into a spacious ticket lobby with sunlight pouring through skylights overhead.

This dream has been hanging like a hazy mirage for almost 10 years as schemes for a new railroad station on the west side of Manhattan have come and gone. Now the best possible deal tantalizes: to regain the splendor of the great and tragically demolished Pennsylvania Station as a 21st-century hub.

The late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan lined up a dizzying array of federal, state and local players in 1998 to replace the grimy labyrinth that passes for a terminal today. Built after McKim Mead & White's soaring 1910 station was torn down in 1963, it bulges with 550,000 daily passengers, more than double its designed capacity.

Moynihan's idea involved only the western two of the four city blocks of the old Penn Station, reworking the elegant neoclassical Farley Post Office that surmounts the tracks between 31st and 33rd streets from Eighth to Ninth avenues.

Now the stars seemed to have aligned to fully realize Moynihan's dream.

Last year, Related Cos. and Vornado Realty Trust -- both of which possess considerable holdings on or near the site -- proposed to bring the rest of Penn Station into the project: the more important half east of Eighth Avenue.

Secret Negotiations

Happy ending? We don't know yet. The developers are negotiating this extraordinarily complex package in secret with New York state's Empire State Development Corp. In outline, an architecturally distinguished "great station'' would preside over the eastern two blocks.

Making way for the station does not include (as it should) blowing up Vornado's 2 Penn Plaza, a 29-story office tower that defaces the more desirable half of the eastern blocks. This building is so ill-sited that it will considerably impede the development of an inviting station design.

The plan does envision the welcome replacement of the grimy, unloved Madison Square Garden. The Dolan family -- which controls Cablevision Systems Corp., the New York Knicks basketball team and the Garden -- would erect a new arena at the western edge of the site, where it would squeeze within the handsome pink-granite walls of the Farley Post Office, possibly flanked by a couple of half-million-square-foot office buildings.

Although state and federal dollars have been allocated for the $2 billion Moynihan Station project, at least $450 million would come from Vornado and Related for development rights that would move from the station site to nearby parcels they control.

Immense Towers

Getting the towers off the roof of the train station -- especially towers that may demand 60,000-square-foot trading floors -- would vastly simplify the station reconstruction. It also would mean erecting an immense amount of space on those off-site parcels. One tower, apparently sketched by architect Pelli Clarke Pelli for Vornado, may stack as much as 2.5 million square feet to the height of the Empire State Building.

What should the public demand from this deal? First of all, it should get a gorgeous landmark gateway. The players must hire top-drawer architectural talent -- and then demand their best, not something that looks like an imitator's work, as happened at Ground Zero.

A bad sign is the Dolans' selection of Canadian architect Brisbin Brook Beynon, a little-known firm whose Web site suggests a talent so meager as to make us long for the dumpy Garden we've got.

Bare-Bones Plan

In any case, great design is not what we'll see later this year when the state and developers unveil a bare-bones "scoping document.'' It's too soon for a real design, officials say. Instead, the public will have 30 days to comment on a vague arrangement of square footage.

Then the project plunges into a technical environmental review process that in the past has been deployed to obfuscate rather than elucidate.

That approach needs to be rethought right now. The project's scope should be the beginning of a genuine public dialogue, not a one-way hearing process. Cities everywhere except New York have learned to involve the public in forums that help people understand what's at stake and resolve inevitable conflicts. New York needs to learn how to do this.

The project, informed by real public input, can then be tested with real architectural designs rather than finessed with a few fuzzy renderings reluctantly released.

That's how to get a great station, and get it done before even the youngest person reading this grows old.

(James S. Russell is Bloomberg's U.S. architecture critic. The opinions expressed are his own.)

To contact the writer of this story: James S. Russell in New York at jamesrussell@earthlink.net .

[Alonzo-ny]

Arent we supposed to be getting something today?

[NYguy]

Arent we supposed to be getting something today?

I don't think we'll be getting anything, but the bids for the west side railyards are due today. Who knows when the MTA will release any information.

[lofter1]

I've been screaming about this for months ... tear down this POS:




Making way for the station does not include (as it should) blowing up Vornado's 2 Penn Plaza, a 29-story office tower that defaces the more desirable half of the eastern blocks. This building is so ill-sited that it will considerably impede the development of an inviting station design.

:eek: http://www.bbb.ca/ (http://www.bbb.ca/) :eek:




A bad sign is the Dolans' selection of Canadian architect Brisbin Brook Beynon, a little-known firm whose Web site suggests a talent so meager as to make us long for the dumpy Garden we've got.

[Alonzo-ny]

I don't think we'll be getting anything, but the bids for the west side railyards are due today. Who knows when the MTA will release any information.

Damn, and i got all excited.

[ZippyTheChimp]

I've been screaming about this for months ... tear down this POS:We'd have to pay through the nose to get Vornado to tear down a fully-leased office building in a prime location.

Not worth the expense.

[Eugenious]

Immense Towers

Getting the towers off the roof of the train station -- especially towers that may demand 60,000-square-foot trading floors -- would vastly simplify the station reconstruction. It also would mean erecting an immense amount of space on those off-site parcels. One tower, apparently sketched by architect Pelli Clarke Pelli for Vornado, may stack as much as 2.5 million square feet to the height of the Empire State Building.

What should the public demand from this deal? First of all, it should get a gorgeous landmark gateway. The players must hire top-drawer architectural talent -- and then demand their best, not something that looks like an imitator's work, as happened at Ground Zero.

A bad sign is the Dolans' selection of Canadian architect Brisbin Brook Beynon, a little-known firm whose Web site suggests a talent so meager as to make us long for the dumpy Garden we've got.

Bare-Bones Plan

In any case, great design is not what we'll see later this year when the state and developers unveil a bare-bones "scoping document.'' It's too soon for a real design, officials say. Instead, the public will have 30 days to comment on a vague arrangement of square footage.

Then the project plunges into a technical environmental review process that in the past has been deployed to obfuscate rather than elucidate.

That approach needs to be rethought right now. The project's scope should be the beginning of a genuine public dialogue, not a one-way hearing process. Cities everywhere except New York have learned to involve the public in forums that help people understand what's at stake and resolve inevitable conflicts. New York needs to learn how to do this.

The project, informed by real public input, can then be tested with real architectural designs rather than finessed with a few fuzzy renderings reluctantly released.

That's how to get a great station, and get it done before even the youngest person reading this grows old.

(James S. Russell is Bloomberg's U.S. architecture critic. The opinions expressed are his own.)



Wow didn't know such a thing as a Architecture Critic still exist ...

At least he has the balls not to pander to Cablevision...

[lofter1]

Dolan scum is a bit easier to kick following Junior's big loss in court last week (not to mention the other upcoming trublations they will suffer via additional employee-related lawsuits).

You're right, Zip -- not worth the cost to scrap 2 PP. Hopefully the new plan will do something to make it look better.

[Fabrizio]

:eek: http://www.bbb.ca/ (http://www.bbb.ca/) :eek:

asleep since about 1988.

[antinimby]

Dolan = bad news

[lofter1]

Great for NYC: Dolan gets butt kicked AGAIN in court and held liable for $Billions in compensation -- so must sell all NYC holdings :D

[NYguy]

http://www.nysun.com/article/64985

State Finally To Make Move On Penn Station

By ELIOT BROWN
October 22, 2007

In a boost to the planned multibillion-dollar remake of Pennsylvania Station, the state is expected to release an environmental planning document today, a required first step in a lengthy approval process for the far-reaching development plans.

The release of the draft scope for an environmental impact statement would be the Spitzer administration's first public display of forward progress on the Moynihan Station project, which seeks to move Madison Square Garden into the back of the neighboring Farley Post Office and spread new development throughout the area.

Economic development officials for months have said the document's release was due in coming weeks, though people briefed on the project say the state seems to have had trouble sorting through a tangled web of stakeholders. Between Amtrak, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, New Jersey Transit, developers Vornado Realty Trust and the Related Companies, Madison Square Garden, the city, and the community, the state has slowly formed a more coherent vision for the project.

While two towering skyscrapers were initially planned for the site above the Garden, the state moved toward a less costly option of spreading the 4.5 million square feet of development rights in the surrounding neighborhood.

"It's a good step for the project," the executive director of the Regional Plan Association, Thomas Wright, said of the scoping document's release. "We're pleased that they're looking for ways to spread the development density around the district."

In briefing officials and community members, the state said and the Post Office may continue operations in some of the Farley building's stamp booths, and officials said the exterior signage on the building would be reasonable, sources briefed said.

The progress comes almost a year after the speaker of the Assembly, Sheldon Silver, blocked the Pataki administration's efforts to advance a smaller scale version of the project before the governor left office. Mr. Silver wanted to see the Garden's move to the Farley building included in the project, along with the renovation of the existing Pennsylvania Station, a vision that has taken the state and developers months to craft.

[londonlawyer]

Since the Penn Station tower has grown from 2.5m sf to 3 m, I wonder if the extra 500,000 sf comes from this deal. Many articles state that the Penn Tower deal depends upon a complex transfer of air rights that requires approvals.

[NYguy]

I think you mean the Hotel Penn tower. I always assumed that site would get some extra footage as a result. There's still the remaining 4 msf, plus the issue of the 2 msf at the SW corner of 34th and 7th.

[londonlawyer]

I think you mean the Hotel Penn tower...

Yes

[Dynamicdezzy]

http://www.arch.columbia.edu/hp/studio/2006-2007/pdf/Farley.pdf

[krulltime]

http://www.arch.columbia.edu/hp/studio/2006-2007/pdf/Farley.pdf


Here is more from that link...


http://www.pbase.com/image/87698236.jpg

http://www.pbase.com/image/87698191.jpg

[MidtownGuy]

What the hell is that crap^
Pardon me if I'm not excited over plans for towers at Farley. I guarantee you they will be very rectangular and stupid looking, especially if that renderng is any indication. I realize the diehards out there will keep squeezing for some beautiful sculpted towers piercing the heavens...but you better get ready for 980 feet of awkward rectangular boredom, probably with a toothpick spire at the top to inflate the height measurement.
If something is going to reach ESB heights, let's hope it isn't as butt ugly as that pockmarked thing in the drawing.

[Dynamicdezzy]

^ I believe it was something done over at Columbia University and their take on how the prop should be used. I apologize for not noting that. I figured it gave us something to do until the real ones are released.

[ZippyTheChimp]

That was scary.

[NYguy]

http://www.nylovesbiz.com/moynihanstation/

STATE BEGINS PUBLIC REVIEW FOR NEW MOYNIHAN STATION
Release of Scoping Document Launches Initial Stage of Public Review

10/23/2007

The Empire State Development Corporation announced today that the State has initiated the public review process for the Moynihan Station project, a sweeping public transit plan to dramatically enhance transportation links in and around Penn Station. The plans are set out in a scoping document that was released to the public today.

The redevelopment includes building a new Moynihan Station within the James A. Farley Post Office, rebuilding the existing Penn Station to improve commuter flow, and constructing a new Madison Square Garden within Farley’s western Annex. This will ease crowds and substantially increase access at Penn Station. Amtrak, New Jersey Transit, Long Island Rail Road, and New York City subway passengers will be able to make connections throughout the larger complex. These public transportation improvements will be subsidized by private development that will serve as a catalyst for commercial growth on Manhattan’s West Side.

Today, Penn Station is America’s busiest passenger transportation facility, handling more passengers than Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark Liberty airports combined.

ESDC will hold a public scoping session on Thursday, December 6th, and members of the public are invited to comment on the scope until Monday, December 17th. The public will also have additional opportunities to comment as the project moves forward.

Once the current MSG is demolished, Penn Station will be rebuilt into the treasure it once was, with an enhanced experience at track level leading to wider corridors, higher ceilings, and – for the first time in 40 years – natural day light. The scoping document describes the four major principles that will guide the design of the rebuilt Penn Station: (1) passengers will be able to access all levels from all corners of the station; (2) there will be a clearly identifiable central hall and meeting place; (3) passengers will move around more easily in day-lit, wider, high-ceilinged corridors; (4) it will be easier for passengers to reach streets, subways, railroad concourses, platforms and adjacent commercial development. All of the project partners are participating in a Design Task Force that will yield conceptual station plans. Cost estimates will follow a final design.

Following the City’s Public Review Process (ULURP), development of up to approximately 5.4 million square feet could be permitted, including a 2.7 million sq ft bonus, provided that MSG is relocated and significant transportation improvements are made.

The scope includes two options for the disposition of this square footage; the creation, by special permit, of a 1.1-million-square-foot, predominantly retail development on the site, and the dispersion of the remaining 4.3 million square feet of development rights into a new zoning sub-district surrounding the Penn Station complex; or the entire bonus and as-of-right development remaining on the Penn Station site in the form of two new towers over a retail and commercial podium.

The first option would minimize construction within and over the operating railroad station.

The project would be completed in two phases. Phase I (2008 to 2011) includes the development of the new train station at Farley, the construction of the new MSG, the redevelopment of the block between 33rd and 34th Streets and Seventh and Eight Avenues, and potential utilization within the sub-district of some development rights transferred from the Penn Station block. One and Two Penn Plaza will remain in place.

Phase II (2012 to 2018) includes the construction of a new Penn Station, and the development of the remaining development square footage. The public train station portion of the project is expected to be funded by the private developers and by contributions by the State, City and Federal governments. Preliminary estimates indicate the project is expected to generate billions of dollars in new tax revenues, thousands of permanent jobs and construction jobs.

[NYguy]

It's gonna take a while to sort through the document, but it looks like regardless of whatever version of the MSG/Penn Station project gets built, the 2 msf tower at the SW corner of 34th and 7th will move forward:
http://www.nylovesbiz.com/pdf/MoynihanStation/DraftScopeofWork.pdf

Construction of approximately 7.5 million zoning square feet of new commercial or mixed-use space. Two options are under consideration for approximately 5.4 million zoning square feet of this development. Under the Penn Station Block Mixed-Use Development Option, up to 125,000 zoning square feet of office and retail space would be built on the west end of the One Penn Plaza block (the block bounded by Eighth and Seventh Avenues and West 33rd and 34th Streets, which contains the One Penn Plaza building) and up to 5.4 million zoning square feet of mixed-use development would be constructed above and around the reconstructed Penn Station (on the Penn Station Block).

Under the Moynihan Station Subdistrict Option, up to approximately 1.1 million zoning square feet of commercial space (predominately retail) would be developed above Moynihan Station East and up to approximately 4.3 million zoning square feet of mixed-use development would be built on multiple receiving sites within a new zoning Subdistrict.

Under both options it is currently anticipated that up to approximately 2 million zoning square feet of commercial space would be developed on the east end of the One Penn Plaza block.


_____________________

More (page 6)
http://www.nylovesbiz.com/pdf/MoynihanStation/DraftScopeofWork.pdf

The Penn East and West Sites. These two sites are located on the east and west ends of the One Penn Plaza block. Under the Expanded Moynihan Project, the One Penn Plaza building would remain (although some modifications are contemplated to parts of the building’s six-story eastern wing) and two new structures are currently proposed for the block. As currently proposed, a commercial building of up to approximately 2 millionzoning-square-foot would be developed on the eastern end of the block (the Penn East site, which fronts on Seventh Avenue).

[NYguy]

On page 20 (18), we get to the meat of the proposals...
http://www.nylovesbiz.com/pdf/MoynihanStation/DraftScopeofWork.pdf

Mixed-Use, High-Rise Redevelopment

Following completion of the new MSG arena by 2011 in the Farley Complex, the existing MSG would be demolished. As described above, there are presently two development options for the utilization of the approximately 5.4 million square feet of bonus and unused floor area available on the Penn Station Block. These two options are described below.

ESDC, MSDC, and New York City will assess the two options, in consultation with the railroads operating at Penn Station, against the goals and objectives of the project, and between issuance of this Draft Scope and completion of the draft SEQRA SEIS and NEPA EIS, one of the two development options will be identified as the proposed project. The draft SEQRA SEIS and NEPA EIS will analyze the selected option as a component of the proposed Expanded Moynihan Project, and will discuss why the other option is not being pursued.

Penn Station Block Mixed-Use Development Option

Under this option, a high-rise mixed-use development would be built on the Penn Station Block above and around Moynihan Station East. This development would consist of up to 5.4 million bonus and unused zoning square feet of office, hotel, retail, and possibly residential uses in two towers (not including the existing 32-story Two Penn Plaza building that would remain on-site).

For this option, there is a proposed commercial scenario and a proposed mixed-use scenario that includes residential space. The Two Penn Plaza building on the Seventh Avenue frontage of the site would remain but could be altered to provide additional retail space, and it would be reclad as part of the project.

Environmental review of the proposed Expanded Moynihan Project will analyze a reasonable worst-case development scenario for the Penn Station Block Mixed-Use Development Option based upon two illustrative private development scenarios for the Penn Station Block. Each scenario would include up to 5.4 million bonus and unused zoning square feet of mixed-use
development as shown in Table 1.

Scenario A of the Penn Station Block Mixed-Use Development Option includes residential, hotel, retail, and commercial office uses. Scenario B includes more office and retail uses, a smaller hotel, and no residential space. Under each scenario, the Penn Station Block would be developed with two high-rise towers above a 115-foot-tall shared base. On East 33rd Street, there would be an approximately 1,100-foot-tall tower massed with a lower component, and an approximately 1,300-foot-tall tower would be located on East 31st Street.

[Eugenious]

Ok so when can we expect the NEPA and SEQRA statements? I say no earlier than fall 2009 :)

no chance this project goes anywhere before 2011...

[Derek2k3]

So under the likely to be chosen Moynihan Station Subdistrict Option we will get a the 1 msf, ~700' tower on the Penn West site AND a 2 msf, +1,250', KPF tower on the Penn East site. That will be a very tall block with 1 Penn Plaza all hemmed in.

Looking at the subdistrict map, the area the development rights can be transferred is pretty large and the towers will be limited to a FAR of 24.

[londonlawyer]

So under the likely to be chosen Moynihan Station Subdistrict Option we will get a the 1 msf, ~700' tower on the Penn West site AND a 2.5 msf, +1,250', KPF tower on the Penn East site....

I think that the Hotel Penn Tower is not the east tower. Instead, I think the east tower will rise on the site that now houses the Tournea and the Foot Locker on the southwest corner of 34th and 7th.

[Derek2k3]

Yea, I know. It was reported to be designed by KPF and taller than the ESB. The Hotel Penn site is to be designed by Pelli and is/was planned to be around the same height of the ESB. Maybe it's even taller since it could possibly be 3 m.s.f.. This will be quite an area regardless of which option the developers choose.

[brianac]

Manhattan: Release of Penn Station Plans

By CHARLES V. BAGLI (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/b/charles_v_bagli/index.html?inline=nyt-per)
Published: October 24, 2007

The Spitzer administration released preliminary plans yesterday for a sweeping redevelopment of Pennsylvania Station, Madison Square Garden and the surrounding neighborhood. The proposal would involve demolishing Madison Square Garden, which sits above the station; building a transportation terminal with 1.1 million square feet of retail space; and creating an adjunct station at the James A. Farley Post Office building. A new basketball and hockey arena will also be built within the walls of the post office, if the project is approved. The developer selected by the state — a joint venture of the Related Companies and Vornado Realty Trust — would also build towers with 6.3 million square feet of commercial space on nearby parcels. Both Amtrak, which controls Penn Station, and the Regional Plan Association (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/r/regional_plan_assn/index.html?inline=nyt-org), a private group, endorsed the proposal. But the Municipal Art Society (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/m/municipal_art_society/index.html?inline=nyt-org), which also favors the redevelopment of Penn Station, called for more public input. Yesterday’s release of the plans, which had neither a lot of details nor any images of the proposed buildings, is the first step in a public review of the project’s environmental impact.

[NYguy]

So under the likely to be chosen Moynihan Station Subdistrict Option we will get a the 1 msf, ~700' tower on the Penn West site AND a 2 msf, +1,250', KPF tower on the Penn East site. That will be a very tall block with 1 Penn Plaza all hemmed in.

That 8th Ave tower is still questionable to me. It either needs to be about the same height as 1 Penn, or lower for it to work, I think. But I need to see the designs. It's a little odd for a wide tower like 1 Penn to sit in between two towers that way.

[NYguy]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/2007/10/24/2007-10-24_new_plan_for_penn_station_and_madison_sq-2.html

New plan for Penn Station and Madison Square Garden

BY JONATHAN LEMIRE
October 24th 2007

The state unveiled a revised $14 billion plan for the Penn Station area Tuesday, featuring a new Madison Square Garden and a pair of grand transit hubs - but only one named after the senator who championed the project.

The concept, on the drawing board for more than a decade, calls for converting the stately James A. Farley General Post Office building on the west side of Eighth Ave. into a new train station named for the late Sen. Daniel Moynihan.

Penn Station, just across the street, would be completely redone to address an issue raised earlier by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan).

The plan's third component would mean the end of the current incarnation of the World's Most Famous Arena: The existing Madison Square Garden would be razed, and a new one would be built along Ninth Ave.

More than 7 million square feet of commercial space would be created, either within two towers above the new Penn Station or - more likely - dispersed throughout the midtown neighborhood.

Because Amtrak, which owns Penn Station, is reluctant to relinquish its busy hub's name, the planning document released by the Empire State Development Corp. yesterday refers to the train stations by different monikers.

However, a development agency official expressed confidence that Amtrak would soften its stance, allowing both stations - which will be connected by tunnels under Eighth Ave. - to be named after Moynihan.

"Today we can be more hopeful than at any time for the fulfillment of my father's vision," said the senator's daughter Maura Moynihan, co-chairwoman of Friends of Moynihan Station. "After years of false starts and delays, we cannot let optimism slip."

The Assembly speaker had blocked a previous version of the plan because it did not include improvements to Penn Station, which serves 550,000 passengers daily.

Silver did not yet have a comment on the new proposal, his spokesman said yesterday.

The original plan called for two skyscrapers - one taller than the Empire State Building - to be built above the new Penn Station, a design that drew fire from preservationists.

A development agency official said yesterday that the organization was leaning toward a new proposal to spread the office space throughout a special subdistrict that could be created by the City Planning Commission. The district would run from W.29th to W. 35th Sts. and Fifth to Ninth Aves.

"This is one of the most significant ... civic and infrastructure projects of our generation," said Robert Yaro, president of the Regional Plan Association.

The combined cost of the public train stations and the private commercial space could exceed $14 billion, said Empire State Development Corp. spokesman Errol Cockfield.

Financing was still being worked out. Although state, city and federal dollars would be involved, no estimates were released. Some post office windows would remain in the Farley building.

The proposal's first phase, construction of the Moynihan Station and the new Garden, would be completed by 2011. The second part, demolition of the current arena and the Penn Station rehab, would be finished by 2018.


http://www.nydailynews.com/img/2007/10/24/graf_penngraf10_24_sub.jpg

[NYguy]

The original plan called for two skyscrapers - one taller than the Empire State Building - to be built above the new Penn Station, a design that drew fire from preservationists.

A development agency official said yesterday that the organization was leaning toward a new proposal to spread the office space throughout a special subdistrict that could be created by the City Planning Commission. The district would run from W.29th to W. 35th Sts. and Fifth to Ninth Aves.

I think the preservationists concerned with the Farley Building, and tall towers are missing the mark here. It's not the height of the towers, or lowering it that concerns me. What no one is talking about is the fact that we may essentially be replacing Madison Square Garden with a 1 msf shopping mall. That's it. I'm not so sure this is what we want there. (I'm sure its not what I want.)

We've been seeing renderings and revisions of the Moynihan/Farley building for years. Now is not the time to suddenly get shy. We need renderings to go with this information, so we can get an idea of exactly what they're talking about. Building a mall topped with office and hotel space is one thing, because density is what's needed there, and office towers fit in with the rest of Manhattan. But simply replacing MSG with a mall is not the way to go, especially at such a prime location, Penn Station. The office space should be concentrated as closely as possible, with Grand Central-like density both above and around it.

If a shopping mall is the best we can get, then maybe they should just remove the Garden, and replace it with a glass dome, opening the entire station to daylight.

[NYguy]

The subdistrict option:

http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/87763342/large.jpg


Options for building on the MSG site:
http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/87763333/large.jpg


Towers to be built in the first phase, on the 1 Penn block:

http://www.pbase.com/nyguy/image/87763323/medium.jpg

[Derek2k3]

What no one is talking about is the fact that we may essentially be replacing Madison Square Garden with a 1 msf shopping mall. That's it. I'm not so sure this is what we want there. (I'm sure its not what I want.)


I mentioned the same thing a few weeks back. Just seems strange.

If the tower plan gets built this area would surpass the WTC in total height. Here's a quick rundown of our potential 500'+ towers completed in the last 8 years, U/C, or proposed. Towards the bottom I have just hopefuls and ones with DOB height figures that probably undervalue the building's true height.

The formatting messed up, so I have the neater text document attached at the bottom.


Freedom Tower 1,776' 82 stories
200 Greenwich Street 1,354' 78 stories
MSG Site Tower I 1,300' -- stories
Penn East Site +1,250' -- stories
Pennsylvania Hotel Tower ~1,250' -- stories
MSG Site Tower II 1,100' -- stories
Bank of America Tower 1,200' 54 stories
175 Greenwich Street 1,155' 71 stories
80 South Street Tower 1,123' 55 stories
New York Times Building 1,042' 52 stories
Convention Center Hotel 980' 90 stories
150 Greenwich Street 974' 61 stories
Beekman Street Tower 950' 68 stories
221 West 57th Street 937' -- stories
One Madison Avenue Tower 900' 74 stories
Trump World Tower 861' 72 stories
Extell Tower 815' 80 stories
Conde' Nast Building 809' 48 stories
Bloomberg Tower 806' 54 stories
240 Church Street 796' 58 stories
356-366 Tenth Avenue 774' 61 stories
Bear Stearns Building 773' 45 stories
Time Warner Center Tower I 750' 55 stories
Time Warner Center Tower II 750' 55 stories
Goldman Sachs Headquarters 749' 44 stories
7 World Trade Center 741' 52 stories
WTC Tower V 740' 42 stories
Times Square Tower 726' 48 stories
50 West Street 725' 63 stories
685 First Avenue, 718' 69 stories
610 Lexington Avenue 709' 62 stories
45 Broad Street 708' 53 stories
Tower 56 700' 50 stories
One Penn West 697' 55 stories
685 First Avenue 698' -- stories
700 First Avenue A 689' 66 stories
99 Church Street --- 68 stories
Random House Headquarters 676' 50 stories
Barclay Tower Apartments 673' 56 stories
708 First Avenue 666' 45 stories
Sherwood Equities Site 1 --- 65 stories
510 Madison Avenue 648' 50 stories
The Epic 642' 59 stories
The Orion 637' 58 stories
Strada 632' 57 stories
700 First Avenue B 631' 60 stories
4 Albany Street 630' 53 stories
160 West 62nd Street 621' 57 stories
605 West 42nd Street 618' 57 stories
425 Fifth Avenue 618' 54 stories
440 West 42nd Street 617' 56 stories
839 Sixth Avenue 614' 53 stories
One Madison Park 604' 47 stories
700 First Avenue, 602' 57 stories
MoMA Site --- 60 stories
Silvercup West II 600' 57 stories
20 Times Square 600' 42 stories
Times Square Plaza 600' 40 stories
Queens Street Apartments 600' -- stories
131-139 West 45th Street 599' 55 stories
Hearst Magazine Tower 597' 42 stories
Second Ave. & 57th Street --- 59 stories
Center at Albee Square 589' 58 stories
Sky House 588' 54 stories
235 West 51st Street 585' 55 stories
W Times Square Hotel 582' 52 stories
Two River Place I 580' 57 stories
Two River Place II 580' 57 stories
10 Platt Street 580' 52 stories
Ernst & Young Building 575' 38 stories
PricewaterhouseCoopers Center 575' 38 stories
Lehman Brothers Building 575' 32 stories
Paramount Tower 567' 51 stories
785 Eighth Avenue 566' 42 stories
Mount Sinai Tower 564' 39 stories
Silvercup West I 557' -- stories
Reuters Building 555' 32 stories
115-117 Nassau Street --- 55 stories
The Belvedere 554' 48 stories
Fifteen Central Park West I 543' 43 stories
2 Gold Street 543' 51 stories
Court Square Two 544' 39 stories
220 Riverside Boulevard 542' 48 stories
Ewalk Westin Hotel 532' 45 stories
515 Park Avenue 531' 43 stories
The Metropolis 528' 48 stories
388 Bridge Street 528' 49 stories
161 Maiden Lane 525' -- stories
William Beaver House 523' 44 stories
The Atelier 521' 46 stories
111 Washington Street --- 52 stories
80 Nassau Street --- 52 stories
NYC Technical College Tower --- 50 stories
Silvercup West III 518' 49 stories
111 Lawrence Street 514' 51 stories
Miss Brooklyn 511' -- stories
Liberty Plaza 510' 45 stories
220 Central Park South 507' 41 stories
616 First Avenue A 505' 47 stories
World Product Centre Tower --- 50 stories
Allied Works Tower --- 50 stories
57th & 12th --- 50 stories
237 Park Avenue --- 50 stories
New U.N. Building 500' 35 stories
The Olivia 500' 35 stories
70 West 45th Street 496' 43 stories
The Platinum 496' 43 stories
Chelsea Stratus 491' 40 stories
Hilton Times Square 475' 39 stories
325 Fifth Avenue 471' 42 stories
The Link 471' 41 stories
885 Sixth Avenue --- 47 stories
Fordham University Tower I --- 47 stories
120 Amsterdam Avenue 470' 42 stories
855-873 6th Avenue 465' 30 stories
Trump Soho Hotel Condominium 454' 42 stories
301 Forty Sixth --- 46 stories
Extell Diamond Tower --- 40 stories
263 West 45th Street --- 40 stories
920 Eighth Avenue --- 37 stories
176 Madison --- 35 stories
4 Hudson Square --- 32 stories
The Drake Swissotel Site --- 30 stories
823 First Avenue --- -- stories
450 W. 33rd St. Expansion Tower I --- -- stories
450 W. 33rd St. Expansion Tower II --- -- stories
555 West 34th Street --- -- stories
Brookfield Dev. Office Tower I --- -- stories
Brookfield Dev. Office Tower II --- -- stories
Brookfield Dev. Res. Tower I --- -- stories
Brookfield Dev. Res. Tower II --- -- stories
Flatbush Avenue Tower --- -- stories
Rockrose LIC Tower --- -- stories
Roosevelt Hotel Site --- -- stories

[TonyO]

NY Observer

Vornado Would Dominate 'Like No Other Landlord' Under Moynihan Plans

by Tom Acitelli

Published: October 24, 2007

Vornado Realty Trust stands to win very big if the current plans for Moynihan Station go through. As the Municipal Art Society puts it on a Web site dedicated to the plans: Vornado "will dominate one district like no other landlord in the city."

Vornado, based in Paramus, NJ, and one of the biggest publicly traded landlords in the nation, already owns about 7 million square feet of commercial space between 31st Street and 34th Street west of Broadway.

Under the plans released yesterday by the Empire State Development Corporation, Vornado and its development partner on Moynihan Station, The Related Companies, could get to build over 7 million square feet of commercial and/or mixed-use space, including buildings to rival the Empire State Building in size (though probably not surpass it).

Also, Vornado owns the Hotel Pennsylvania across the street from the current Penn Station and Madison Square Garden. The landlord has long talked about tearing down the hotel and building a gigantic office tower in its place. (Press reports have put the tower's size at no less than 2 million square feet; the Empire State Building is about 2.8 million.)

For perspective, consider this: The World Trade Center site office development--which is spread among different developers, like Silverstein Properties and the Port Authority--should create about 10 million square feet of new office space. Vornado could end up building or helping build nearly the same amount in a roughly 15-block area--where it already owns about 7 million feet.

Vornado properties in the area include the 2.58 million-square-foot One Penn Plaza and the 1.1 million-square-foot 11 Penn Plaza.

[Optimus Prime]

Yea, I know. It was reported to be designed by KPF and taller than the ESB. The Hotel Penn site is to be designed by Pelli and is/was planned to be around the same height of the ESB. Maybe it's even taller since it could possibly be 3 m.s.f.. This will be quite an area regardless of which option the developers choose.

How do we think this option would look, with two towers bookending One Penn Plaza? I'm having some difficulty imagining it not looking awful, but that may just be my poor imagination. ;)

[antinimby]

As the Municipal Art Society puts it on a Web site dedicated to the plans: Vornado "will dominate one district like no other landlord in the city."Instead of fighting for great architecture and design like they should be, this worthless organization is now worrying about who owns what.

I don't give a damn who makes out better in this. I just want this city to finally get this whole MSG/Penn Station/Farley mess right and have gorgeous timeless landmarks in their place.

For all the mistakes and terrible architecture this city's had to endure ever since the Old Penn Station was demolished, we deserve that much.

People, companies and their monies/profits come and go but what they will build here we will have to live with for at least the next century.

Please, please MAS do not spoil any chance for us to get something beautiful by worrying about who makes what. You are an arts organization, stick to what you know best.

[NYguy]

The 34th St tower will be at least 1,000 from this document...
http://www.nylovesbiz.com/pdf/MoynihanStation/DraftScopeofWork.pdf
(page 17)

Penn East Site

The Penn East site may utilize up to approximately 2 million zoning square feet of unused development rights generated by the Farley Complex or may be a receiving site for the transfer of development rights from the Penn Station Block. The existing retail structure on the site would be demolished, the LIRR Penn Station West 34th Street entrance would be relocated to the west, modifications would be made to portions of the six-story east wing of the One Penn Plaza building, and the site would be redeveloped with an approximately 2 million-zoning square-foot commercial office building (with a height of about 1,000 feet) with retail space and an enclosed pedestrian arcade between West 33rd and 34th Streets. The development would incorporate a new LIRR entrance on West 34th Street, subway station access improvements, a below-grade connection to Moynihan Station East, access to NJT’s proposed ARC station, and a street-level through-block connection across from the West 33rd Street entrance to Moynihan Station East.

[TREPYE]

Please, please MAS do not spoil any chance for us to get something beautiful by worrying about who makes what.

Hold on, lets relax there for a second and not loosely throw around the word "beautiful" when talking about Vornado. Doing a little investigation on their office projects that they own they are pretty much enamored with building mundane glass boxes which are not "beautiful". I am not holding out much hope from Vornado cuz they are one of these typical development companies that make a S--- load of money and dont invest in building anything beautiful. I could be wrong but check out the track record....

http://www.vnooffice.com/images/02_details.jpg
http://www.vnooffice.com/images/16_details.jpg



http://www.vnooffice.com/images/12_details.jpg

http://www.vnooffice.com/images/06_details.jpg

I know people are gonna have a problem with the Bloomy Tower --which I admit has its virtues-- but big picture wise this was a watered down version of something a lot better. They managed to get Pelli to lower his standards in this design cuz this is some of his most mudane work, specially up top. Im afraid that they'll do the same when he designs one of the Penn station projects. I hope I'm wrong.

[sfenn1117]

I mentioned the same thing a few weeks back. Just seems strange.

If the tower plan gets built this area would surpass the WTC in total height. Here's a quick rundown of our potential 500'+ towers completed in the last 8 years, U/C, or proposed. Towards the bottom I have just hopefuls and ones with DOB height figures that probably undervalue the building's true height.


Nice list....and pretty amazing to think that we will be getting two supertall clusters in the next decade or so.

[NYguy]

Nice list....and pretty amazing to think that we will be getting two supertall clusters in the next decade or so.

Maybe three, if things go right on the West Side...

[BPC]

I find Pelli's Bloomberg Tower to be a beautiful building. Interestingly, I once read an interview with Frank Gehry about Beekman, and they asked him to point to a Manhattan office tower he liked, and that was the one building he cited.

[londonlawyer]

I find Pelli's Bloomberg Tower to be a beautiful building. Interestingly, I once read an interview with Frank Gehry about Beekman, and they asked him to point to a Manhattan office tower he liked, and that was the one building he cited.

I agree.

I hope that Vornado reskins 330 Madison. Ten years ago, the GCS area was a dump. It is now great, but this building is an eyesore. If they hired a competent architect to reskin it, it could get over $100/sf.

http://www.vnooffice.com/images/16_details.jpg

[lofter1]

And re-skin this horrid pile of old glass 888 Seventh Avenue (http://retail.vno.com/property.asp?propid=140) / W 56th ...

From Central Park this looks like some forlorn trailer park in the sky (http://www.mariewinn.com/marieblog/uploaded_images/NEST&arrowapr2507j-799337.jpg) http://wirednewyork.com/forum/images/icons/icon13.gif

http://www.vnooffice.com/images/12_details.jpg

[TREPYE]

I find Pelli's Bloomberg Tower to be a beautiful building. Interestingly, I once read an interview with Frank Gehry about Beekman, and they asked him to point to a Manhattan office tower he liked, and that was the one building he cited.

Its nice, but dont you think it was a little watered down by Vornado up top?

[TREPYE]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/02/opinion/02fri3.html?ei=5087&em=&en=e509620ed869a39e&ex=1194235200&pagewanted=print
November 2, 2007
Editorial
A Station Worthy of New York

After years of secrecy, the first inklings of a new and potentially workable plan to recreate Pennsylvania Station have finally become public. There are no lovely drawings yet, but the barest outline for the future railway terminal — a variation on the vision championed by the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan — is now available at nylovesbiz.com/moynihanstation (http://nylovesbiz.com/moynihanstation).
Unlike previous plans, this proposal could work because it relies on a mix of public and commercial interests — a large new train station surrounded by offices, shops, residences and a new Madison Square Garden.
Still there are reasons to be wary. A new terminal should be a grand public space, as magnificent, in its way, as the glorious old Grand Central Terminal. Yet, there are signs that what is being called the new Moynihan complex could easily shortchange the public’s interests in favor of the private developers.
Under the proposal, the Garden, which now sits on top of the station, would move a block west to the back of the elegant Farley post office building. What is now Pennsylvania Station could finally be opened to natural light with a soaring glass entranceway.
As a public facility, however, the new station cannot be overtaken by an overwhelming 1 million square feet of retail space now being proposed by developers. New York City, of all places, does not need a shopping mall with a railroad station tucked inside.
The real trouble comes across Eighth Avenue in the post office, which would become part-train station, part-post office and part-entrance to Madison Square Garden. That could be a workable marriage, but New Yorkers and Gov. Eliot Spitzer must make sure that the Farley building becomes a truly public space, not merely the passageway for people going to events at the Garden.
The old Farley building should be converted primarily into a train station, and it should include Amtrak as well as New Jersey Transit. At this point, Amtrak executives have decided not to move passenger facilities from their present site a few hundred feet away. They should rethink this decision. Once the Farley lobby is renovated with an arching glass roof, it would be just the tonic for Amtrak’s beleaguered customers — who now scurry through underground rooms bereft of light or character.
Finally, the Beaux-Arts stairs and columns on the front of the old Farley post office cannot become primarily an entrance to the Garden — or a bulletin board to hawk Garden events. (Trepye: Yikes!!!:eek:)This is no ordinary building. Built to complement the old Pennsylvania Station, torn down 44 years ago, the Farley is a public treasure that must be preserved. The last thing New York needs is another dreadful Pennsylvania Station that only serves developers and Madison Square Garden.

Copyright 2007 (http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/copyright.html) The New York Times Company (http://www.nytco.com/)

Touche!
Once again the NYTimes comes through with a sage editorial about this city's architectural fabric.

[ablarc]

There are no lovely drawings yet, but the barest outline for the future railway terminal — a variation on the vision championed by the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan — is now available at nylovesbiz.com/moynihanstation (http://nylovesbiz.com/moynihanstation).
Words, words, words, WORDS!

[Eugenious]

Perhaps "Le vent a tourné"?

[NYguy]

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2007/11/05/2007-11-05_toward_a_fair_deal_on_the_west_side.html

Toward a fair deal on the West Side

November 5th 2007
Editorial

Gov. Spitzer and Mayor Bloomberg are facing big challenges in guiding development that would transform the area around Penn Station markedly for the better. They must protect the interests of New York taxpayers as the project advances.

On the table are the creation of two grand train stations that would serve the Long Island Rail Road, Amtrak and New Jersey Transit; construction of a new Madison Square Garden, and the erection of office towers up to 1,000 feet in height. Each component offers substantial pluses.

The public would enjoy modern transportation facilities, including a station in the Farley Post Office building to be named after the late Sen. Pat Moynihan. New York would gain an up-to-date venue for sports and entertainment. And there would be a welcome addition of office space.

The critical question: Who will pay for a new Penn Station for construction where the Garden now stands? The cost must be met primarily by the real estate developers, Vornado and the Related Cos., which are poised to build, as well as by the Garden's owner, Cablevision. The city and state should bear none of the burden.

This is proper because City Hall and Albany have already bestowed enormous financial benefits on Vornado, Related and Cablevision. By rezoning the Garden property to allow construction of office towers and by offering the arena a new location a block west, officials boosted the value of the land stratospherically - to well over $2 billion at today's market prices. They also gave Cablevision a golden opportunity to escape the outmoded Garden and to open shop in a state-of-the-art facility in the rear half of the Farley building.

Against that backdrop, the developers are negotiating for more. The price tag for creating an airy, efficient transit hub has been estimated at $2 billion, although officials have yet to unveil a design or complete a cost analysis. Vornado and Related have offered to kick in just $450 million, with the remaining $1.5 billion to be covered by federal, state and city funding.

The governor and the mayor must say no on behalf of New York taxpayers. And, federal aid notwithstanding, they must ensure the builders write a check that is far larger than the one they've been discussing. The check must reflect a clear understanding that the government is manufacturing huge wealth for Vornado, Related and Cablevision.

When the city rezoned the Garden in 2005, it permitted construction of up to 5.5 million square feet of commercial space on the site. Instantly, the property value soared. At today's market rate of as much as $400 per square foot, it's well above $2 billion.

Vornado and Related also made a killing under a now-defunct Farley Post Office development scheme. There, the state agreed to sell them the right to build 1 million square feet of space in the neighborhood. The price became extremely favorable as real estate values climbed. It stands at $123 million, several hundred million less than the going rate.

The developers plan to further boost building power by purchasing an additional 1 million square feet of development rights from the state at a price to be determined. All told, they hope to amass 7.5 million square feet of space, an amount equal to almost four Empire State Buildings. And they have the rare and valuable opportunity to put most of it on sites that are ready for building.

Under special zoning amendments, they would then erect a large shopping mall on the Garden site; build two skyscrapers across the street to the north, one more than 700 feet tall, the other 1,000 feet tall, and they would sell 3.5 million square feet of development rights to builders for projects in the surrounding area.

Clearly, Vornado and Related are positioned to reap a bonanza. But the zoning rules say that in exchange, they must make transportation improvements. Which is where the plan to build a new Penn Station enters the picture. Even a $1 billion contribution to the project would be dramatically less than the value that's been created for them by the city and state. Which is why Spitzer and Bloomberg must hold them to every penny of their obligations while shielding New York taxpayers.

[lofter1]

... Under special zoning amendments, they would then erect a large shopping mall on the Garden site ...

Oh, good, then we can be just like Minneapolis or Valley Stream :cool:

Will someone, please, put the Dolans in a box and throw it in the Hudson :mad:

[ASchwarz]

Um, I think shopping is not something particular to the Midwest or suburbia.

I hear Tokyo, Paris and London have a bit of shopping, some of it even integrated with rail terminals (the horror!) Actually, NYC has quite a bit of shopping integrated with rail (Grand Central, Penn, WTC, Atlantic Terminal, Jamaica Center, etc.).

[NYguy]

Will someone, please, put the Dolans in a box and throw it in the Hudson :mad:

That one isn't the Dolan's fault. It's a combination of the state and the developers.

[NYguy]

Um, I think shopping is not something particular to the Midwest or suburbia.

It's not the shopping that's the problem here (it is manhattan afterall). It's the shopping mall that will occupy such a prime site in what is to be Manhattan's newest business district that's the problem. There needs to be more to that site than simply a large shopping mall. And they won't even show us designs for that.

[ASchwarz]

But covered shopping is not inherently suburban or uninteresting. Only in America do people think that covered shopping = suburbs. If anything, I would argue that covered shopping = cities/urban environment.

Tokyo's Shinjuku station has multiple shopping centers and department stores directly connected to the rail plaforms. Tokyo is hardly suburban.

[Fabrizio]

AShwarz: your whole purpose on this forum seems to be pro anything and everything that is developement in NYC.

Anything.

And to be instantly and smugly contrarian... as a matter of course.

Although, if it has to do with Miami, Washington, Dubai.... SUDDENLY a critical eye is turned. In Miami, even the parking lots are better than the stuff they chose to build. (wanna see the posts?).

----
BTW: in America people do think that covered shopping = suburbs. Because mostly it does. In America.


---

[lofter1]

But of course here in NYC wew have the lovely and inviting Manhattan Mall just down the block --

A financial success perhaps, but no need to copy it.

[ASchwarz]

Fabrizio,

I would argue that you are the contrarian. If you think covered shopping is an inherently suburban activity, I would direct you to Milan or Paris. Galleria Vittorio Emanuele is just so suburban, you know.

As for your more general comments, pot meet kettle. Your whole purpose appears to be against all new construction or anything positive in people's lives. With few exceptions, your posts luxuriate in memories of crime, filth, misery and despair.

If it's a parking lot or an abandoned building, you will praise it. If its a new building, you think it's horrible.

[ASchwarz]

BTW: in America people do think that covered shopping = suburbs. Because mostly it does. In America.

---

Great, but NYC isn't America. It is a tremendous outlier in every respect. Covered shopping in Manhattan has no more to do with suburbia then covered shopping in Tokyo, Milan, Sao Paulo, etc.

Also, what does it matter what most Americans think? Most Americans think tract homes, SUVs and Wal Mart are essential to quality of life. This worldview is largely irrelevant to Manhattan land-use decisions.

[Fabrizio]

As for your more general comments, pot meet kettle. Your whole purpose appears to be against all new construction or anything positive in people's lives. With few exceptions, your posts luxuriate in memories of crime, filth, misery and despair.

If it's a parking lot or an abandoned building, you will praise it. If its a new building, you think it's horrible.


No, you are wrong again. Actually, while being critical to some, I have been favorable to the majority of new projects posted here... From the obvious like the Hearst and Times (from day one), but even to residentials like the Link, the Orion and the William Beaver. I've praised Trump here. I like the looks of his new project in SoHo. I'm one of the few with some good things to say about his West Side development. I'm happy about the new Foster project, Ghery's building, One Madison Park, Meier in B'lyn and on Perry, the pink Julian Schnable condo, the 11th st. Jean Nuovel Building, the Zinc, everything by Robert Stern...even praised the Pei building on the site of those townhouses torn down on 56th. I have no regrets about 50 West Street making way for Helmut Jhann and the list goes on... and on.

So what are you talking about?

---

Malls: Yes in America they mostly equal suburbia.

Please note this thread with my PRAISE for the Trump Tower mall and the article I posted by Paul Goldberger.

http://wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=8466&page=35

[Jim856796]

If a new Madison Square Garden is built within the General P.O., won't that area be smaller than that of the current Garden? a smaller area would mean a smaller capacity and a smaller capacity means a smaller Garden than the current one. I'm gonna be opposed to the new Madison Square Garden because of this.

[lofter1]

Way back in this thread (or the Moynihan Station thread) Zippy posted info showing how a new arena (same size as existing) could fit within the Farley Building, but it would "spill over" at the top.

However smaller sports venues as replacements seem to be the way things are going, no? Look at new Mets & Yankees. Both will have fewer (more expensive seats) with a lot more "luxury boxes" to serve the rich guys and fill the pockets of the owners (but leaving many fans watching at home or in a bar).

[ZippyTheChimp]

won't that area be smaller than that of the current Garden?A typical NBA/NHL arena will fit into the Farley annex, but unlike the present MSG, it will be oval, not circular - like the new Nets arena at Atlantic Yards.

MSG thread (http://wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4732)

[ZippyTheChimp]

On the subject of retail at a new Penn Station:

Retail at a railroad hub isn't always the same as a shopping mall at a railroad hub. It'll depend on how 1 million sq ft is distributed throughout the complex.

There's plenty of retail at GCT, but when you enter, you know you're in a railroad terminal, not Roosevelt Mall.

[londonlawyer]

I agree that a mall won't be bad. There isn't room for new large department stores to build. Therefore, this could house a Nordstrom's, a Harrods, etc.

[JMGarcia]

I have absolutely no problem with a "mall" at Penn Station. The concept works well in every major world city I've been to in Asia, Australia, and Europe. The knee jerk reaction against it in NY is parochial at best. Hell, even Chicago has some great "malls" on N. Michigan Ave. Both Boston and SF have malls in the urban core that work quite well.

[lofter1]

Well ... hoping you enjoy yourselves walking in circles at the new mall.

Just make damned sure that it looks good from the outside.

[Jim856796]

Are you sure that the newoval-shaped Masison Square Garden will interfere with the design of the glass atrium-like structure to be built in the middle of the Post Office? If so, renderings of the new Garden need to be released soon.

[ablarc]

http://www.observer.com/2007/maura-moynihan-middle-dad-s-penn-station-dream

[lofter1]

From that ^ article:



According to a source familiar with the plan, once the arena is moved (anticipated to occur in 2011), the current Penn Station would be unearthed and covered with a glass roof, which would let sunlight reach the ground floor and concourses. The state will choose between two plans: One would put large 90-story towers on the north and south sides of the block; the other would put a million-square-foot shopping center there and disperse the remaining development rights to nearby parcels. The state and developers have taken to calling the redone Penn Station “Moynihan East” and the converted Farley building “Moynihan West,” although it is questionable whether Amtrak will change its nomenclature from “Penn Station.”

The plan, while lacking any architectural renderings, has drawn lukewarm reactions from preservationists.

“I think it would be fantastic to do two train stations, and I think moving Madison Square Garden can be done, but it is up to the state to make sure the public does win,” said Ms. Breen. “You don’t want Moynihan East to become a shopping mall and Moynihan West to become a lobby to Madison Square Garden, which I think is what it is becoming.”

[STT757]

There will actually be three stations,

Moynihan West (Farley Post Office), main tenant will be NJ Transit.

34th Street concourse, where new Hudson Tunnel will terminate. 6-8 tracks underneath 34th between Macy's and the current Penn Station. This will be the sole domain of NJ Transit.

Moynihan East (current Penn Station), main tenants will be Amtrak, LIRR, NJ Transit? and Metro North?

Getting these three stations tied together in a way that is pratical, easy to navigate and understand is going to be real tricky. However if done right it could possibly be the Mid-Town version of the World Trade Center Transit hub with it's East-West connector from the Winter Garden/World Financial Center, Calavatrava World Trade Center PATH Hub, Fulton Street Transit complex.

For the Mid-town hub they need to connect with a large underground concourse Moynihan West-Moynihan East - 34th Street NJ Transit station as well as Macy's, PATH and the B, D, F, N, Q, R, V, W trains. There used to be a hidden corridor connecting the PATH with Penn Station that was closed a long time ago. A new modern underground concourse connecting all the areas train lines as well as a new Garden and Macy's is what's needed.

[RS085]

Interesting perspective from an article I saw floating around:

"I think a new building is a potential problem. Show me a team that has had success in their new buildings and I'll show you two that have had serious troubles selling out since the move.

Show me a team that got a new building and didn't raise prices because of it and I'll show you a team that made that happen by taking away prime tickets for fans in seats by putting luxury boxes in their places. They kept the average seat prices down by creating the extra 1500 to 2000 seats in the farthest reaches of the buildings often with obscured views. Sure the prices didn't go up, but your 50 feet further than you were before with much less leg room because of the increased angle of seating from row to row.. Thats not a tradeoff I want.

The other point which needs to be made is that Madison Square Garden doesn't have to move or be affected at all in order for Penn Station to be renovated and upgraded ( or revitalized as in reality one of the major upgrades would be open air lighting, which in fact existed in the past ) because a large amount of it sits beneath the Post office, not under MSG.

As far as a new hotel? Who gives two shits... there are new and renovated hotels all over midtown. Do the hotels across the street and on diagonals to the Garden help me or other fans in any way? The last time I stayed in a hotel in NYC was for the parade and for the All-star game both way back in 1994.

Want to talk about an area that would help revitalize NYC more than anything else.... try talking about the former WTC and it's surrounding neighborhood. Thats where NY both the city and State need to spend the money on revitalizing in order to help the economy, the quality of life and the morale of New Yorkers.... certainly not midtown.

But again, what are these features and efficiencies that you speak of in modern buildings? I don't happen to have a problem with the scoreboard. The only real reason these enormodomes need super scoreboards is because too many of the affordable seats are so far from the action that you can't actually watch it live effectively. Our scoreboard seems quite fine to me.

Comparing Yankee Stadium which was literally falling apart and had chunks of structural concrete falling in recent years is different than talking about the Garden. Yankee Stadium was built in 1923 not 1968... thats a big difference when your talking about something needing to be modernized.

Same with Boston Gardens, that was an exact copy of the third Madison Square Garden. We replaced that in 1968, to talk about how the Celtics and Bruins moved out of their place as an example that the Rangers could do the same is backwards.
They moved out of a building that we moved out of 27 years earlier.

Yankee Stadium in fact was built while the Rangers were still in Madison Square Garden II, we had built and played in III for 43 years before we moved on to the Garden we are in now and the Yankees have been in the same building...
That should give you an idea of how old those places were when they left.
So let's not use examples of truly outdated buildings as examples of the Rangers moving.

I can tell you first hand and most Boston fans will tell you the same thing... Boston Garden was small, dirty and lacked ALL amenities... but it was 10 times better to watch a hockey game in... it had history, it had feeling, it got louder than the new building it had everything a HOCKEY fan wanted... and that goes the same for Maple Leaf Gardens, The Forum and The Joe. The only building that might be better as far as replacements is the Flyers place because the old Spectrum just sucked. It was a fishbowl and it took 10 minutes to get to the bathrooms ( not including the lines when you got there ) from the upper seats.

Please... give me a couple of those amenities that you speak of that would somehow make the Rangers games better in a new building... it's bad enough I see empty seats now at Rangers games... increasing the capacity by 2000 may seem nice for the bottom line profit... but it certainly won't help make the building feel any more alive or vibrant.

oh, and please explain how MSG had hurt the NYC economy, since your bringing up economics of the city I'd like to ask how (apart from not paying real estate taxes on MSG, which I'm sure will not change at any new Garden either.)"

[ZippyTheChimp]

More like a rant than an article. I lost interest after...

As far as a new hotel? Who gives two shits.

[Alonzo-ny]

Id give one but i cant afford two.

[NYguy]

http://ny.metro.us/metro/local/article/60_seconds_with_/10820.html

60 seconds with …
… Maura Moynihan, founder of Friends of Moynihan Station

by amy zimmer / metro new york
NOV 21, 2007

INTERVIEW. Maura Moynihan — daughter of the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan — handed out more than 800 leaflets yesterday morning to get Penn Station commuters to support the new transit hub that will bear her father’s name. Moynihan talked to Metro about why she’ll continue leafletting until she sees the jackhammers.

Why launch this campaign?

We’re taking it to the people. Taking it to the streets. Otherwise it’s just sitting in board rooms behind closed doors. That’s been happening the last 20 years. It is poignant to go there and see people in the heart of “the pit” and see the anxiety on their faces as they hither and dither about. It’s a waking nightmare. When was the last time someone said to you, “Let’s meet for a drink at Penn Station?” Whereas people go to Grand Central all the time.

Doesn’t everyone want Moynihan Station to happen?

It’s like world peace. Everyone wants it to happen, but people don’t want to make any changes.

Can the time line be sped up?

It will go fast as people wake up to their self-interest. It’s a jobs project. It will create a minimum of 30,000 construction jobs. It’s a public works project and a transportation project, and it’s a green project, because it involves public transportation. I can’t wait to see the wrecking ball tear down Madison Square Garden. It’s so vile. How they tore down the original Penn Station in the first place is a travesty. We can’t have the old one back, but anything is better than the garbage we have now.

[NYguy]

http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--newpennstation1119nov19,0,3456414.story

Plans slowly moving forward for new Penn Station in NYC

By AMY WESTFELDT
November 19, 2007

NEW YORK - Picture Penn Station with a sloping, glass-paneled roof, natural sunlight pouring in and thousands of passengers passing through a huge, majestic concourse just like Grand Central Terminal.

That was 1963, and that Penn Station is gone. The Beaux-Arts landmark was demolished and replaced by the Madison Square Garden sports arena and a dark, underground warren of passages and platforms that make up the nation's busiest train station.

Maura Moynihan, daughter of the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, calls it "the pit."

"It is an offense ... not just to transportation, but to good taste generally," she said.

After more than a decade of false starts, a $14 billion plan is moving forward to rebuild the station _ which would be named after Moynihan, a longtime fundraising advocate for a new hub _ and the dingy neighborhood surrounding it.

It hinges on Madison Square Garden agreeing to sell its arena on the spot where the original station stood, and move into an annex in a landmark post office building across the street.

That building, the James A. Farley Post Office, would also house a grand atrium with glass ceilings for more than 550,000 passengers who pass through the station each day _ more people than use all three New York City-area airports put together. More than 5 million square feet of commercial and retail space would be built around it, in a new city business district similar to one that enlivened the area around Grand Central decades earlier.

"That district is the poor stepcousin of Midtown," said Vishaan Chakrabarti, president of the Moynihan Station Venture, the project's developers. "It's really the last area that really hasn't been revitalized."

The venture includes Related Cos. and Vornado Realty Trust; Vornado owns more than 6 million square feet of commercial space in the neighborhood, as well as a hotel just outside the district that is being pursued as a possible new headquarters for Merrill Lynch. Just west of the train station, billions of dollars in new development is planned along the Hudson River waterfront.

Redeveloping the station and the area around it has been talked about for over a decade, and designs of the main concourse have been revised for the past eight years. The state Empire State Development Corp., under the administration of former Gov. George Pataki, last year failed to win approval of the three-member Public Authorities Control Board to go forward. The board said at the time that the plan needed to be bigger, addressing the needs of the entire train station _ home to Amtrak, New Jersey Transit, Long Island Rail Road trains and half a dozen subway lines.

The agency presented a new version to the public last month, proposing rebuilding the entire station for about $2 billion, moving the Garden to the post office and creating the new business district to spur high-end commercial development.

Negotiations for virtually every aspect of the project are still under way. The Postal Service has sold most of the building to the Empire State Development Corp., although it will still keep a historic, 24-hour lobby with Tiffany's furniture open for business. The developers and the agency are discussing funding for the station; public funding from federal, state and city sources could amount to less than $1 billion, said the agency's downstate chairman, Patrick Foye.

It also needs approval of Amtrak, which owns the station. Spokesman Clifford Cole said Amtrak supports the project but wants assurances that a new station will make more space available for riders, such as waiting areas and better stores and restaurants.

Mostly, it needs the Garden, whose plans have already riled preservationists worried that moving a sports arena into a landmark building would threaten a piece of history in the same way the old Penn Station was destroyed in 1963.

"We don't want history to repeat itself here," said Peg Breen, president of the New York Landmarks Conservancy. "There is no need for the Garden to wreck Farley."

The post office is considered a crown jewel of New York City architecture, with its imposing Corinthian columns and gigantic staircase.

Breen and other preservationists deride reports that owners of the Garden plan to build a glass wall facing the concourse, saying it would overwhelm the train station. They worry that billboards advertising rock concerts and basketball games would be draped over the columns outside the building.

Said Foye: "We are very focused on the preservation issues at Farley ... We have not agreed to a glass wall." He also said billboards would not obstruct the columns and facade on the building's Eighth Avenue exterior.

Garden officials declined comment on their needs for the arena, beyond an earlier statement that they are "continuing to explore all opportunities" in the neighborhood, including moving the Garden.

If the arena does not agree to move, it plans to renovate the existing arena, blocking redevelopment of the train station under the arena.

"I don't want to have to be the person to have to explain to 600,000 passengers ... that they didn't get a new Penn Station because someone objected to a glass wall," said Chakrabarti.

And Maura Moynihan, who belongs to a civic group promoting the project, said her father would approve, despite the many arguments over the design.

"This is a chance that will never come again," she said. "We can't ask for perfection from any project at this late date. We have to move quickly."

[BrooklynRider]

I don't think I'm ever going to open this thread and find good news. It gets rather tiring to hear about the old Penn Station over and over again. Clearly, it is so far in the past that references to it no longer resonate with present-day train riders.

I also fail to understand why MSG could not be taken through emminent domain, since the privately owned arena is standing in the way of a public works project.

[ablarc]

I also fail to understand why MSG could not be taken through emminent domain, since the privately owned arena is standing in the way of a public works project.
Now there's an idea!

[pianoman11686]

^City wouldn't be able to afford the legal fees.

[ZippyTheChimp]

I also fail to understand why MSG could not be taken through emminent domain, since the privately owned arena is standing in the way of a public works project.Since it isn't a blight (looking blighty doesn't count), the city as initiator, would have to bear a heavy burden of compensation to get them moved.

[ablarc]

^ Yeah, but the mere threat of it could be a negotiating tool.

[ZippyTheChimp]

I'm not so sure, since they want to move anyway.

The things they are negotiating for now might become automatic in a forced move. They might even get more.

[ablarc]

Any way you look at it, MSG is a malignant presence in New York.

[ManhattanKnight]

It isn't obvious that if MSG were acquired through eminent domain, compensation for the taking would extend beyond the value of the condemned property to include its replacement costs. That would depend on, among other things, which governmental entity did the taking. It isn't just the City of NY that could conceivably act here. Amtrak and the MTA are already interested parties and can exercise eminent domain, as can the Port Authority and the usual alphabet soup of NY State and City agences that are not yet involved in this mess.

[GVNY]

Any way you look at it, MSG is a malignant presence in New York.

It never used to be. Thanks 1960s.

[BrooklynRider]

I think it became malignant with the injection of the RNC into the site in 2004. Before that, it was just offensive.

[scumonkey]

TOWER PLAY AT FARLEY STATION


By TOM TOPOUSIS

http://www.nypost.com/img/newsart/article_storybottom.gif
September 21, 2007 -- State officials reviewing a proposal to convert the Farley Post Office into a train station and a home for a new Madison Square Garden said yesterday they want to drop plans to build two enormous office towers on the arena's current site.
Instead, planners are looking to have the proposed 4.5 million square feet of office space "sprinkled" across the surrounding Midtown neighborhood, said Pat Foye, chairman of the Empire State Development Corp.
The state has been reviewing a proposal by a consortium of developers to create the Moynihan Station inside the Eighth Avenue side of the Farley Post Office, while moving the Garden into the Ninth Avenue side of the postal building.
Developers had proposed building the towers above the site where the Garden now sits, as well as a third tower across the street. The plan included a major renovation of Penn Station.
Foye told members of the New York Building Congress that shifting the office space proposed for the two towers to sites around Penn Station "will mean less disruption to commuters, fewer financial risks, and it will tie the development around Moynihan Station to the demands of the market."
Foye said the change has the approval of the two developers on the project, the Related Companies and Vornado Realty.
A $900 million plan to convert the post-office building into a new rail station, hotel and retail complex was blocked late last year when Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver would not use his vote on the Public Authorities Control Board to give it final approval.

[ablarc]

A $900 million plan to convert the post-office building into a new rail station, hotel and retail complex was blocked late last year when Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver would not use his vote on the Public Authorities Control Board to give it final approval.
And a year later we're no closer to deciding how to proceed. Moynihan Station could, however, be half done by now.

Projects like this should be done incrementaly; no master plan is realized entirely as envisioned anyway. And finally: the results are better when done piecemeal. That's how good cities are done: piecemeal in small chunks.

Somebody on another thread suggested that New York wasn't too good at large-increment development. I heartily agree, except I think it's really not too good anywhere.

Build Mynihan, already, and let the rest take care of itself when the time comes.

[pianoman11686]

^Yeah. Strangely enough, it was pretty much exactly a year ago (13 months) that this process entered the expansion phase. Back then I was calling for the Moynihan conversion to start immediately, regardless of what happens to MSG. People got excited about new skyscrapers, and somehow forgot that Moynihan has been, and still is, the first step in the plan. Now it sounds as if we won't even be getting a massive MSG-redevelopment. (Big surprise there.)

Meanwhile, Moynihan languishes.

[BrooklynRider]

^Which means the process is being handled by a bunch of morons. Rule # 1 for a good project director is management of scope. They obviuosly have a person who either has allegiances other than those to the public good OR so weak that he is being ridden roughshod by developers.

[NYguy]

http://nymag.com/news/features/41564/index2.html

How a new Madison Square Garden, a new Penn Station, and a new shopping mall could be squeezed into the Farley Post Office.


The whole West Side plan began with Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s notion that the old Farley Post Office would make a splendid gateway to New York. By righting the wrong of Penn Station’s 1963 demolition, it gave aesthetes and civic boosters a reason to fall in behind a big rebuilding project. Only later did it become a potential gold mine for developers.

With the backing of Governor Spitzer, and driven by the developers Steve Roth of Vornado and Steve Ross of Related, the plan has swelled to include a replacement for the seedy Madison Square Garden, which ought to make owners Charles and James Dolan very happy. Yet they may be the ones to scotch the plan.

Why? The colonnade facing Eighth Avenue, topped by the neither-snow-nor-rain-nor-heat-nor-gloom-of-night motto, will be the project’s public face. Everyone wants a piece of it. The current plan calls for the Farley to be split in two, with the train station in the eastern end (where the portico is) and the new Garden being stuffed in the back, with a glass shell in between.

But here’s the catch: The Dolans have to agree to move, or nobody gets a big payoff. And, not wanting their arena to be stuck out of view, the Dolans are holding out for a portion of the Eighth Avenue portico as their entrance, with major signage. They also want a glass wall inside the complex, abutting the train station, so passersby can see the action. The point of Moynihan’s plan was that Penn Station craves dignity, and an entrance to the circus isn’t what he had in mind. In essence, the Dolans are holding the senator’s vision hostage. You want a station here? You have to come through us.

The second but no less crucial player in all this is Related/Vornado. Competitors at Hudson Yards, they’ve teamed up here to take advantage of the Dolans’ departure. Their plan to replace the Garden calls for a second, modern entrance to Moynihan Station across the street from the Farley, a retail development above that, and a mix of office towers on all Vornado’s nearby turf. (For that story, turn the page.) The tracks and related infrastructure stay more or less where they are, beneath the current and future stations, and newly accessible from both sides of Eighth Avenue.

http://nymag.com/news/features/map071210_2_560.jpg

2A. THE NEW GARDEN
Principals: Jim and Chuck Dolan
Developer: ESDC


2B. MOYNIHAN STATION WEST
Visionary: Daniel Patrick Moynihan
Developer: ESDC

Its grim aesthetics aside, the current Penn Station runs at twice its intended passenger capacity and must be replaced. But it’s been slow going. Various railway-station designs have been commissioned by the Empire State Development Corporation over the past fifteen years—and in each iteration, the architectural flair of the glass roof has been pared down. This March, the ESDC finally purchased the Farley building from the Postal Service for $230 million, and Maura Moynihan, the senator’s daughter, has turned her boundless energy to the task of keeping alive her father’s dream, putting her voice behind anybody who can move the project forward. As she declared at the press conference last Wednesday: “Whatever we have to do to get the jackhammers moving, we’ll do it.”

But the project may not be as straightforward as the senator thought it would be. It’s become apparent that the Beaux-Arts building isn’t exactly lined up above many of the commuter tracks, leading to the plan for a second entrance across Eighth Avenue.

_______________________________________________

With the old Garden all but demolished, two builders propose a new station and a major high-rise upzoning.

If Steve Roth succeeds in purchasing the current Madison Square Garden site in partnership with Steve Ross, his play will go down in history as one of New York’s great real-estate coups. Why? As of this July, the answer was simple, if audacious: They would tear down the structure and redevelop the site as an eastern entrance to Moynihan Station, adding two 90-story towers rivaling the Empire State Building in size. Ross was to take charge of this development—the nearby Time Warner Center was a similarly complicated site and proved a financial success—and he hired the same architect (SOM) to design the complex, this time together with Norman Foster.

But the Roth-Ross plan immediately encountered problems. The architects reportedly clashed (no surprise, given the demands of the site and the egos involved); Spitzer’s team and civic organizations like the Regional Plan Association, while in theory supportive of Moynihan Station, expressed misgivings over a scheme to once again bury a train station under massive development (see the nightmare of today’s Penn Station); and the developers themselves reportedly got cold feet. So the two-iconic-towers plan has been scratched, and instead, the developers are lobbying the city to let them redistribute the buildings’ bulk, piecemeal, all over the neighborhood.


3. MOYNIHAN STATION EAST
Principals: Steve Ross and Steve Roth
Potential Roadblock: The Dolans

Even without the pair of planned skyscrapers on top, Moynihan Station East will still sit beneath a glorified shopping mall. (The two halves of the station will, together, contain 1 million square feet of retail space, three times as much as can be found at the Time Warner Center.)

Total project cost for the stations is estimated at about $2 billion, of which Vornado and Related have offered to put up only $450 million. It’s expected the state will squeeze more out of them, but the remaining funding would come from the city, the state, and the Feds. But will this part of the complex take Moynihan’s name? Amtrak wants to stay on this side of the avenue, and stick with “Penn Station”—a link to its own history.

4. THE MOYNIHAN STATION DISTRICT
Principals: Steve Ross and Steve Roth
Potential Roadblock: City Planning

Under the Related-Vornado proposal, the city would rezone the immediate neighborhood to accommodate 4 million to 5 million square feet of development rights—in effect, chopping up the two hypothetical towers and sprinkling them into smaller parcels from Ninth Avenue almost all the way over to Fifth. Conveniently for Roth, Vornado has spent the last decade acquiring about a dozen sites within the zone. He and Related would develop the sites (mostly as office buildings) in a 50-50 joint venture.

5. HOTEL PENNSYLVANIA
Principals: Steve Ross and Steve Roth
Potential Roadblock: Sheldon Silver

It was only about a month ago that Vornado announced plans to build a new headquarters here for Merrill Lynch, but already the plans are in doubt. Despite a ruckus by a few preservationists, it’s hard to see what about the building is worthy of preserving, aside from its famous phone number (Pennsylvania 6-5000). Still, that’s the least of the problems: Merrill’s new CEO, John Thain, may not support the move to midtown; the rezoning might not move through in time, given that Merrill’s current lease runs out in 2013; and Sheldon Silver will put pressure on Merrill to stay downtown. If Merrill walks away, the KPF-designed building across Seventh Avenue would also be in jeopardy.

[212]

Under the Related-Vornado proposal, the city would rezone the immediate neighborhood to accommodate 4 million to 5 million square feet of development rights—in effect, chopping up the two hypothetical towers and sprinkling them into smaller parcels from Ninth Avenue almost all the way over to Fifth. Conveniently for Roth, Vornado has spent the last decade acquiring about a dozen sites within the zone. He and Related would develop the sites (mostly as office buildings) in a 50-50 joint venture.

Does anyone know -- if these sites have anything nice right now, besides the Hotel Pennsylvania?

[TREPYE]

http://nymag.com/news/features/41564/index2.html
the nearby Time Warner Center was a similarly complicated site and proved a financial success—and he hired the same architect (SOM) to design the complex, this time together with Norman Foster.

But the Roth-Ross plan immediately encountered problems. The architects reportedly clashed (no surprise, given the demands of the site and the egos involved)

Well did you honestly they think that a great architect like Foster is gonna concede to a cheap no talent firm like SOM-NY??:rolleyes:

[ablarc]

^ For a cheap no-talent, Childs sure has a big ego.

He should be content to fetch the coffee.

[antinimby]

Childs, Kondylis, Kaufman, O'Hara, Poon - all plying their trade right here in the good ol' Big Apple and nowhere else.

We are simply cursed I tell you.

[ablarc]

^ Hack Heaven.

[Eugenious]

Lol...this project is a joke, they can't even get Architects to agree, nothing is going to happen here for a looooooooong time....and when it will it aint gonna be pretty :)

[ablarc]

...they can't even get Architects to agree...
Nothing unusual about that.

[antinimby]

^ Hack Heaven.Any theories as to why this is?

[TREPYE]

^ For a cheap no-talent, Childs sure has a big ego.

Inexplicably so.:confused::rolleyes:

[ablarc]

Didn't Childs and Foster attend the same architecture school? Were they there at the same time?

[TREPYE]

Childs, Kondylis, Kaufman, O'Hara, Poon - all plying their trade right here in the good ol' Big Apple and nowhere else.


Any theories as to why this is?

Because in many cases architects dont design buildings in this city accountants do. These stiffs design to the appeal of a ledger not a skyline.

[ablarc]

Any theories as to why this is?
There are only frustrated architects.

The field attracts artistic types, the education confirms it as an artistic process, then after graduation reality crashes in and demonstrates that it's only artistic for a tiny perecentage of architects. We can name them all.

Everybody else spends his time looking up data in codes.

[BPC]

^ Hack Heaven.

Whatever. Childs, if I recall correctly, designed the new Bear Stearns building, which IMHO is the best looking skyscraper to be built in this town in a good while. Meanwhile, going to work in Times Square ever day, I have to pass by the ugliest skyscraper built in this town in a good while, the critically-lauded NYT building designed by the brilliant Renzo Piano. Perhaps the City could use a few more hacks and few less geniuses.

[ASchwarz]

Agreed, Bear Stearns is great. I don't know if I can compare it to NYTT. They're so different.

I don't think SOM is bad at all. They aren't great, but they generally get the job done. I like TWC, Bear Stearns, 7 WTC, Random House and the Memorial Sloan Kettering Research Building. They're all above average.

I think the Diamond District tower could be decent too. Not great, but decent depending on the skin.

[NoyokA]

Another thing about SOM NY, there are David Child's projects and then projects by other architects.

Bear Stearns
450 Lexington Avenue
One World Wide Plaza
Times Square Tower
Freedom Tower
7 World Trade Center
Time Warner Center

The only one I don't like in that group is TXSQ Tower (although the original unbuilt-version by Childs was awesome)

are all David Child's

CIBC Tower
Random House
Diamond Tower
Memorial Sloan Kettering

and countless other stinkers were designed by others at SOM.

[antinimby]

Agreed, Bear Stearns is great.I wouldn't exactly call it great. The base is totally nondescript and underwhelming while the octagonal shape of the tower and crown sets it apart and are its only redeeming qualities.

Add everything together and it gets a "it's all right."

[Alonzo-ny]

Its not an all glass box and looks pretty good.

[JMGarcia]

SOM NY (Childs) did the basic design for Bear Stearns. BS wasn't originally happy with the facade treatment and SOM Chicago (Adrian Smith a man of real talent) redid/refined the facade including the crown.

[NYatKNIGHT]

^which are its best features. It's got stumpy proportions too.

[Adyton]

Last week, the ESDC & MTD stated they would release plans TODAY. Any public announcements yet in the media today?

[TREPYE]

I don't think SOM is bad at all. They aren't great, but they generally get the job done.

Just out of curiosity ASchwartz, in all seriousness, are you a developer or are in the development business??:confused:

[ASchwarz]

Just out of curiosity ASchwartz, in all seriousness, are you a developer or are in the development business??:confused:

I am not a developer, but I work with affordable housing developers, mostly in Brooklyn and Queens, so you could say I am in the "development business."

[ZippyTheChimp]

Developers Reportedly Try To Lure Macy's To New Penn Station

December 06, 2007

There is word that the developers of the new Penn Station are reportedly trying to lure Macy's away from its Flagship location at Herald Square.

Public officials and real estate executives tell the New York Times that developers are talking with Macy's in the hopes of convincing the department store to move from its 105-year old landmark building on 34th Street to a glass-enclosed mall inside the new train station.

Macy's and the developers declined to comment.

Last month, the developers unveiled a conceptual model for an eight-story station west of 7th Avenue.

The proposal hinges on whether Madison Square Garden is willing to move to a new home inside the walls of the Farley Post Office. The old MSG would then be demolished to make room for a new Penn Station with 1.1 million square feet of retail space.

A public hearing is scheduled for today at the Farley Post Office on the $14 billion proposal.

Copyright © 2007 NY1 News. All rights reserved.

Unnecessary.

[STT757]

When I was in Las Vegas this past July I visited a really nice hotel across the strip from my hotel (Venetian), this mall had two Macy's. One was a high end Macy's which was more along the lines of a Bloomingdales or Nordstrum, the other Macy's was more affordable with Charter Club etc..

I would think Macy's folks would balk at moving from their current location unless..

A.) The new development site would offer a remarkable product which would be both modern and timeless, something people who are visiting "must see".

or..

B.) Macy's splits their operations between two facilities across the street from one another.

[lofter1]

More ...


An Effort to Tempt Macy’s From a Century-Old Home


NY TIMES (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/06/nyregion/06macys.html?_r=1&ref=nyregion&oref=slogin)
By CHARLES V. BAGLI
December 6, 2007


Is New York ready for a Miracle on 33rd Street? The developers behind the long-gestating plan to rebuild Pennsylvania Station and redevelop the surrounding neighborhood are trying to lure Macy’s from its 105-year-old landmark building in Herald Square to a glass-enclosed mall that would sit inside the new train station, public officials and real estate executives said.


The developers — Stephen M. Ross of Related Companies and Steven Roth of Vornado Realty Trust — are in the early stage of negotiations with Macy’s, which inspired the 1947 movie “Miracle on 34th Street.” It is the latest wrinkle in a complicated $14 billion proposal, which is the subject of a public hearing to be held today at the James A. Farley Post Office on Eighth Avenue, between 31st and 33rd Streets.


Even the project’s critics agree that there is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to rebuild the cramped and confusing waiting rooms, tunnels, platforms and retail spaces that make up Penn Station, the nation’s busiest railroad station. Advocates say it is also an opportunity to create a monumental gateway to the city, redress the demolition of the original train station in the 1960s and develop a vibrant new business district.


But it is also enormously complex, requiring the coordination of Amtrak, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, New Jersey Transit, the Long Island Rail Road and the city subways, as well as the creation of new zoning districts. And the work must be done without interrupting transit services.

In addition, the project could involve a public investment of well over $1 billion at a time when New York is engaged in a series of other multibillion-dollar transportation projects, including the Second Avenue subway, the extension of the No. 7 line, and a new train tunnel under the Hudson River.


So far, the developers have offered to put up $450 million toward the estimated $2 billion cost of the station. But since the project could be enormously lucrative for the developers, that number is expected to grow. The developers have lobbyists in Washington trying to obtain federal financing, but the project will also require hundreds of millions from the state and the city.


“This is a tough, complicated deal,” said Patrick J. Foye, a co-chairman of the Empire State Development Corporation, which is overseeing the proposed project. “We’re guardedly optimistic that we’ve got enough momentum now that we’ll be able to resolve all the issues.”


It seems unlikely that Macy’s would abandon the landmark building, despite its age and inefficiencies. Macy’s and the developers declined to comment.


Neither the state nor the developers have released any renderings of what a new station might look like, or cost estimates for the public investment. But at a Nov. 29 meeting, the developers unveiled a conceptual model for state, city and transit officials that showed an eight-story station west of Seventh Avenue with an undulating glass canopy that would allow light into the underground waiting rooms and ticket areas.


There would be station entrances on both Seventh and Eighth Avenues and vast public halls larger than those at Grand Central. The big retail spaces would be concentrated on the station’s north and south sides.


After more than two years of work, the developers scrapped a plan this summer to replace Madison Square Garden with a pair of massive skyscrapers over Penn Station, after determining that it would be almost impossible to do the work while trains continued to run.


The city and the state are now proposing the creation of a special zoning district that would allow the developers to transfer more than 6.3 million square feet of development rights across a 20-block area surrounding Penn Station. The development rights could be transferred, for example, to the site of the Pennsylvania Hotel on Seventh Avenue, which Mr. Roth’s company already owns, and the block currently occupied by Macy’s.


Over the last year, the various transportation agencies have become deeply involved in the planning for the proposed station, something that had not happened earlier.


A coalition of civic groups, including the Municipal Art Society, the Regional Plan Association and the Landmarks Conservancy generally support the project, but are worried that the original impetus — the creation of a new station with monumental public spaces akin to Grand Central Terminal — is getting lost in the developers’ desire to build office towers, shopping malls and a new Garden.


“We all think this has enormous potential,” said Peg Breen of the Landmarks Conservancy. “The public has to come out of this with two distinct, well-designed train stations. No one wants to come up from the station into a lingerie department, or the Garden’s lobby.”


The current proposal hinges on the willingness of Madison Square Garden, which sits above the station, to move to a new, $1 billion home one block to the west, inside the walls of the Farley Post Office, between Eighth and Ninth Avenues. The old Garden would be demolished to make way for a new Penn Station with 1.1 million square feet of shops and department stores.


The developers, in turn, would build a ring of office towers totaling more than six million square feet of space — the equivalent of three Empire State Buildings — around the new train station, transforming an aging neighborhood into a new commercial district. At the same time, an adjunct transportation station would be created at the Farley Post Office, across Eighth Avenue from Penn Station.


(The tracks run under both sites out to the West Side railyards.)


The current design for the new Garden would take up about two-thirds of the Farley building and rise about 30 feet above the roof line, although state officials are encouraging the Garden to lower the profile. Preservationists have objected to the Garden’s plans to install ticket vendors at the historic stamp windows and to replace an interior brick wall with one of glass, which would allow commuters to view the interior of the basketball court.


State officials, however, say they have not made a decision on the glass wall, and insist that the Postal Service will continue to sell stamps in the lobby behind the Eighth Avenue colonnade.


Copyright 2007The New York Times Company

[Eugenious]

Travesty.

[investordude]

Clearly, the Macy's building should be landmarked. I'm skeptical Macys will move - part of the appeal of city shopping is the ability to go to places like the Macy's flagship.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Clearly, the Macy's building should be landmarked.It is.

[Eugenious]

When there are whole blocks of nothing but 2 or 3 story shacks and garbage retailers in the area, they want to move the most iconic NYC landmark that is Macy's? Are these people on drugs? The whole area around Penn station excluding a few buildings such as the post office and hotels is garbage, infact Macy's is one of the highlights of the neighborhood if not the whole city. Whoever made this ridiculous proposal needs to be fired from the planning comission. Not to mention that Macy's will never give up what is essentially it's biggest location and it's heart and soul.

[lofter1]

As is / was ^ the Hearst Building (http://a810-bisweb.nyc.gov/bisweb/PropertyProfileOverviewServlet?boro=1&houseno=300&street=west+57th&requestid=0&s=A03C41B885B461E4F46BD08866A7430E) -- which didn't stop them from building through and above the original landmarked structure.

[ASchwarz]

When there are whole blocks of nothing but 2 or 3 story shacks and garbage retailers in the area, they want to move the most iconic NYC landmark that is Macy's? Are these people on drugs?

Not surprisingly, I completely disagree.

Your problem is not with developers; it is with NYC zoning and the economic needs of large financial firms.

Small taxpayer buildings are generally not useful for big office sites (zoning limitations), and financial firms need larger footprints.

[TonyO]

When there are whole blocks of nothing but 2 or 3 story shacks and garbage retailers in the area, they want to move the most iconic NYC landmark that is Macy's? Are these people on drugs? The whole area around Penn station excluding a few buildings such as the post office and hotels is garbage, infact Macy's is one of the highlights of the neighborhood if not the whole city. Whoever made this ridiculous proposal needs to be fired from the planning comission. Not to mention that Macy's will never give up what is essentially it's biggest location and it's heart and soul.

My first thought about this is that it's such a long-shot that there has to be another reason: bargaining chip with Madison Square Garden. If the MSG is the only potential anchor to Farley West, then they can call all the shots. With Macy's in the picture, no matter how absurd, MSG suddenly has less of an upper hand.

[ZippyTheChimp]

It's all here...
The development rights could be transferred, for example, to the site of the Pennsylvania Hotel on Seventh Avenue, which Mr. Roth’s company already owns, and the block currently occupied by Macy’s.First of all, the developers aren't stupid. They just don't care about any iconic Macy's building, iconic Penn Station, or iconic anything.

There's 1 million sq ft of retail/commercial space to be filled at Penn Station. Macy's has that at Herald Square. Only the outside of Macy's is landmarked, and I'm sure the site itself has unused air rights. Is there a better spot (conomically) for an office tower?

If they're not careful, runaway greed could turn this entire district into a soulless office park with a suburban mall.

[ASchwarz]

Macy's consists of multiple buildings built over a period of a few decades.

I have no idea of its landmark status, but its certainly possible some parts are landmarked and others are not. Also, landmarks has delandmarked portions of sites in exchange for restoration of other portions of the same site.

In regards to the plan, I will reserve judgement until we hear more.

[lofter1]

The whole area around Penn station excluding a few buildings such as the post office and hotels is garbage ...

Macy's will never give up what is essentially it's biggest location and it's heart and soul.


Wow ... Folks are really attached to Macy's ...

It must be from years of indoctrination via the Thanksgiving Day Parade or something. Shopping in the Macy's flagship building is far from a fun experience.

Eugenious: The first comment above is a fairly ridiculous -- there are indeed many developable lots nearby and around the Penn Station area, but much of what exists to the north and south and east are fantastic & classic NYC buldings which are by no means garbage.

And who says Macy's is moving? Did Hearst move? No -- they re-thought their oold building and made it better. Maybe Macy's will expand. Or become something new and different for the future.

[ZippyTheChimp]

It must be from years of indoctrination via the Thanksgiving Day Parade or something. Shopping in the Macy's flagship building is far from a fun experience.You could have made the same observation about the Plaza as a hotel experience compared to many of its competitors.

Not the point, is it?

[investordude]

One place where department stores on train stations work extremeley well in Japan. I am actually thinking that might be what Vornado is thinking about here.

But Japan is better at some thing than we are - like crowd control and building efficient train stations. In particular, dealing with all of the crowds of a Macy's flagship and all of the crowds of the nations busiest train station at the same time seems like a headache - and one that efficient, orderly Japan will do better than we can. And it probably makes an emergency evacuation of the station all that much more difficult. And it reduces the amount of retail that would fill the streets surrounding the station.

A better strategy would be a limited high end retail environment similar to Grand Central coupled with retail in the surrounding office towers.

[kliq6]

Vornado is all talk, this wont happen and this redevelopment overall will be nothing more then a new train station, some decent retail and maybe one office tower with a slim chance of a MSG move

They want to try and get MSG to move, which they WONT without those tax breaks and Bloomberg wont budge on that. This plan will move forward when the next mayor is in office in 2010

[lofter1]

Not the point, is it?

Only in regard to tthe emotional response to a mention of a Macy's move --

Not in regard to the actually Macy's building -- or other buildings that may rise within & around it.

[arcman210]

A coalition of civic groups, including the Municipal Art Society, the Regional Plan Association and the Landmarks Conservancy generally support the project, but are worried that the original impetus — the creation of a new station with monumental public spaces akin to Grand Central Terminal — is getting lost in the developers’ desire to build office towers, shopping malls and a new Garden.


I've been arguing this exact point in the Garden thread (those posts probably should have gone here looking back on it). The area doesnt need to move Macys at all, the Garden move doesnt have to come via office development in the surrounding area, nor does it have to go in the Farley annex when it ultimately comes time to move it.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Only in regard to tthe emotional response to a mention of a Macy's move --

Not in regard to the actually Macy's building -- or other buildings that may rise within & around it.Again, wasn't that the point about the Plaza, not the building which is intact, but that it remain a hotel?

The response to a possible move by Macy's also involves the direction Penn Station redevelopment would take.

[ZippyTheChimp]

I've been arguing this exact point in the Garden thread (those posts probably should have gone here looking back on it).The passage you cited speaks of the entire Penn Station, not just Moynihan East.

How does this get done without moving MSG?

[stache]

You could have made the same observation about the Plaza as a hotel experience compared to many of its competitors.


Did you have a bad experience at the Plaza? As another poster suggested, they could create a Macy's east and west, like Bergdorf's.

[arcman210]

The passage you cited speaks of the entire Penn Station, not just Moynihan East.

How does this get done without moving MSG?

It doesnt, but for now lets not let the Dolans and Vornado take control of the development because in the end, they will have an overpowering presence over the whole thing. My view is just get Moynihan rolling already.

I'm sure theres already an answer for this, but how come nobody has ever proposed putting the new Garden over those 9th avenue rail yards instead of cramming it into the Farley annex?

[MidtownGuy]

This whole idea is repulsive. Macy's is perfect right where it is. Always full of shoppers, the old details like wooden escalators etc, it's living history! Could they really be considering this?
I would love to see a new Century 21 sister store instead. Can you imagine the business it would do!

[arcman210]

This whole idea is repulsive. Macy's is perfect right where it is. Always full of shoppers, the old details like wooden escalators etc, it's living history!

Plus when its cold out and I'm looking for a place to sit down, the sofa and armchair section upstairs is just so warm and cozy and never too crowded! :D

[ZippyTheChimp]

Did you have a bad experience at the Plaza?No, every time has been memorable. Just noting the rationale that was expressed in several places in the Plaza thread.


As another poster suggested, they could create a Macy's east and west, like Bergdorf's.That would be fine, but at at such an early point, when there isn't even a commitment by MSG to move, I don't think Vornado is talking about a Macy's annex.

There are any number of retailers similar to Macy's that could be attracted once a plan is finalized. I think it's either Macy's as a major anchor, or the site of the present store for development - or both.

[ASchwarz]

According to Propertyshark, the Macy's building is NOT landmarked.

They could be wrong, but there's no designation on the block.

[ZippyTheChimp]

National Historic Landmark.

[antinimby]

This doesn't even make any sense to me.

Why would Macy's want to move from their world-famous Herald Square building to another ordinary glass mall and why the developers want them to move there?

[ramvid01]

^^ they want an anchor tenant for their mall. I don't think Macy's would move completely, but maybe move a department there to open up more space in the older building.

[antinimby]

But that still doesn't make any more sense. There are plenty of other big name department stores that doesn't have a presence nearby that can do the anchoring.

I'm guessing they probably want Macy's building for some greedy devious purpose.

[pianoman11686]

Bring in Nordstrom or Neiman Marcus - neither of which have a presence in NYC yet.

I seriously doubt they could find the type of space in the new station to outfit Macy's inventory as it currently stands in the flagship store. It's just too much - no way, IMO, they end up leaving that building.

[lofter1]

DOB main page for Macy's building(s) (http://a810-bisweb.nyc.gov/bisweb/PropertyProfileOverviewServlet?boro=1&houseno=151+&street=west+34th+street&requestid=0&s=A03C41B885B461E4F46BD08866A7430E) show these addresses for that block:

1317 - 1329 BROADWAY
105 - 173 WEST 34 STREET
441 - 459 7 AVENUE
108 - 168 WEST 35 STREET

Tax Block / Lot: 810 / 1

The space for "Landmark Status" designation is BLANK on that ^ page.

A search at LPC for both "Macy's" and the corresponding addresses comes up with NOTHING.

Here is a LINK (http://www.arch.columbia.edu/hp/studio/1998-1999/pdf/Midtown%20South.pdf) (pdf file) to an in-depth 1999 Columbia University Grad School of Architecture 79-page report regarding buildings for possible Landmarking in Midtown South.

The Macy's building is included as one of the buildings in need of protection by LPC.

A search of that document using "Macy's" turns up multiple references.

That report notes (on page 18) that the Macy's building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places (however that designation offers no real protection for a building).

Appendix 7 (page 72) of that report shows (as ASchwarz mentioned earlier) that the Macy's buildings were built incrementally over a period of time. The chart on that page also shows which buildings are Landmarked (L) and which are listed on the National Register (NR).


The report cites only the "NR" designation for Macy's, and does NOT show an "L" :
Macy's: W. 34th Street and Broadway (NR)
Build Date(s): 1902; additions 1924, 1928, 1931
***

[antinimby]

That explains everything. They want to move Macy's out of that building just so they can tear it down and build a bigger SOM glass box. :mad:

Greedy dirtbags.

[ZippyTheChimp]

What's your point Lofter, that you're OK with this building coming down because it doesn't have LPC designation?

The Register listing notes its importance in NYC history, beyond the politics of the LPC.

[ASchwarz]

Bring in Nordstrom or Neiman Marcus - neither of which have a presence in NYC yet.



Nordstrom is likely coming to 57th just west of Park.

Neiman Marcus is the same company as Bergdorf's. I doubt they want the two to compete in Midtown (though Bergdorf's is more upscale).

More important, Macy's is not the issue. The extremely valuable land occupied by Macy's is the issue. Macy's makes a ton in Manhattan, so if they aren't in Herald Square, then they will be on the MSG site.

If the site is redeveloped, expect to see two huge, soaring towers, one on the Broadway side and one on the Seventh Avenue side. The current zoning + the massive air rights from MSG would allow for two very impressive skyscrapers.

I also imagine they would build tons of multilevel retail fronting 34th.

[antinimby]

I could care less what they plan to build. That Macy's stays right there.

It's the reason that whole damn area is still a thriving, bustling shopping district.

This city is starting to disgust me.

[ZippyTheChimp]

How about McSams Herald Square?

:rolleyes:

[lofter1]

What's your point Lofter, that you're OK with this building coming down because it doesn't have LPC designation?

The Register listing notes its importance in NYC history, beyond the politics of the LPC.

Not at all ^

Just listing information.

We both wrote in separate posts earlier this morning that the Macy's buildings were / are Landmarked. We were both wrong. I think most of the people who have an interest in NYC architecture just assumed (like we did) that the Macy's buildings were protected.

While the National Register listing is, of course, important in regard to educating people about a specific building such a listing gives no legal protections to a structure. LPC designation would do that. At this point in time they could tear down that entire block and no one could do much about it.

In fact, if the owner of the Macy's building were to submit certain applications at DOB before LPC acted then LPC would NOT act at all (as has been shown in a number of instances, such as 50 Trinity Place (http://wirednewyork.com/forum/showpost.php?p=177523&postcount=21)).

[investordude]

I'm all for development, but they shouldn't be allowed to get rid of Macys. If that building isn't a part of New York's history nothing is. I mean, landmarks just designted some obscure pencil warehouse in Greenpoint that nobody gives a sh*t about. This is the essence of the New York of the movies and the holidays. If Macy's went bankrupt, they could revoke the landmark designation, but until then, they should keep Macys where it is. If Macys wants to expand by taking up part of the Moynihan in addition to its current space I'd be OK with that - but I restate my basic concern that 1 million square feet of retail AND a train station AND MSG on the same site is too densely populated and would be beyond the threshold of danger if there was a need to evacuate either MSG or the train station in an emergency.

[NoyokA]

I don't want to see Macy's demolished/altered. This development is getting more and more ridiculously horrible by the day. Let me get this straight the plan right now is to tear down Macy's and MSG, replace Macy's with a tower and replace MSG with a shopping mall. Why don't they just do what they originally planned, tear down MSG (good), replace it with iconic towers, train concourse, and incorporate retail (all good), and leave MACY's (good). What’s with this trend to try and whitewash everything that is quintessential to New York?

[ZippyTheChimp]

Not at all ^

Just listing information.

We both wrote in separate posts earlier this morning that the Macy's buildings were / are LandmarkedI always knew the building didn't have an LPC designation, just the wrong choice of words.

I was referring to this post, which takes a dismissive attitude toward concern for the building's place in NY history.

[scumonkey]

Look what happened to Gimbels.....

[lofter1]

I was referring to this post, which takes a dismissive attitude toward concern for the building's place in NY history.

I was referring to the current shopping experience inside the Macy's building. Which for the most part I find to be discombobulating.

Didn't mean to imply that the building itself has no importance or that it should be hit with a wrecking ball.

My turn for choice of incorrect wordage :cool:

[ZippyTheChimp]

If the MSG is the only potential anchor to Farley West, then they can call all the shots. With Macy's in the picture, no matter how absurd, MSG suddenly has less of an upper hand.I was puzzled why you thought Vornado was trying to get Macy's into the Farley annex. Rather than put pressure on Dolan, he could say, "Go ahead, what about the rest of your project?"

Did you get this from Gothamist? (http://gothamist.com/2007/12/06/developers_want.php) They referred to the NYTimes article, and stated:

"are in the early stage of negotiations with Macy’s" to move from the store's landmark Herald Square location to the Farley building on Eighth Avenue.

The actual quote from the article:
to a glass-enclosed mall that would sit inside the new train station

[Eugenious]

It's 2008 guys, they don't even have a plan, consensus, nothing, only wild and crazy proposals trying to get more attention more money and waste more time.

Whats next? Demolish the ESB for another glass skyscraper?

[ablarc]

This is turning into a jamboree of greed. They should have just built Moynihan in Farley.

Then nobody would be talking about tearing down Macy's and the Pennsylvania Hotel --both essential pieces of New York's heritage and identity.

See what happens when you wait around for integrated master plans for a large area? They figure out how to squeeze maximum dollar out of undoing the best of the city.

Give me piecemeal any day.

Fie.

[ZippyTheChimp]

It's 2008 guys, they don't even have a plan, consensus, nothing, only wild and crazy proposals trying to get more attention more money and waste more time.Calm down.

The Draft Scope and Public Notice were issued on 10/22.
http://www.empire.state.ny.us/pdf/MoynihanStation/DraftScopeofWork.pdf
http://www.empire.state.ny.us/pdf/MoynihanStation/PublicScopingNotice.pdf

The meeting was scheduled for Dec 06 4-8PM

It's going on right now.

[BrooklynRider]

Macy's = Miracle on 34th Street

Macy's and Herald Square would be nothing without each other. People visit Macy's because it is a landmark - not because it is a great department store.

[ZippyTheChimp]

I hope some images were released to the public at the meeting tonight. I know it's all still formative, but it would be nice to get a reference point.

[ramvid01]

My opinion of this plan is, the bigger it gets in scope, the less likely ANYTHING will happen. It seems like they are trying to come to a compromise while bringing in more parties into the situation. This is a complete circus considering what the purpose of this was, and that was a train station.

Dumbfounding really.

As for Macy's moving and the possibility of the block being redeveloped, well I can say is that my stomach turns at the idea.

[TonyO]

I was puzzled why you thought Vornado was trying to get Macy's into the Farley annex. Rather than put pressure on Dolan, he could say, "Go ahead, what about the rest of your project?"

Did you get this from Gothamist? (http://gothamist.com/2007/12/06/developers_want.php) They referred to the NYTimes article, and stated:


The actual quote from the article:

If they are referring to the area of Farley East then my conspiracy theory is off. However, if like the rendering Gothamist used, they are referring to the intermodal hall then it would be impossible to have both Macy's and MSG.

[BrooklynRider]

What is the sense on mixing the madness that is shoppers at Macy's to the madness that is Penn Station?

It serves neither to bring in more crowds.

[JCMAN320]

When it comes to Macy's and the Pennsylvania Hotel, I go by this addage if it's not broke don't fix it.

These people designing these fanciful ideas and defacing Midtown in the process could f-up a wet dream for crying out loud.

Just go with original plan, put MSG in the West Farley Moynihan station in East Farley and a glass canopy over the concourse where the current MSG is and call it a day.

[ablarc]

^ Works for me.

Maybe you could also replace those two office boxes that crept in with MSG in the Sixties. Hundred stories each.

[TREPYE]

Say, would it be possible to strip one Penn Plaza (and two PP for that matter) and merge the structural elements into part of an even bigger (and hopefully better, which shouldnt take much) adjoining towers once MSG is demolished?

[TREPYE]

Sooo.....doe any body know if this ^ is possible. Resident architects?

[lofter1]

Are you describing a project which would span 33rd Street above street level (thereby linking -- in the air -- 1PP & 2PP)?

[TREPYE]

No, using the structural elements as part of two different adjourning towers next to one and two penn seperately. Sort of use One Penn Plaza as the first setback portion of a bigger tower. One and two penn will not be connected to each other.

In Illustration: N=structure of newtower P=structure of one (or two) penn plaza

N
N
NP
NP
NP
NP
NP
NP

[Alonzo-ny]

Doubtful, unless for some reason they overbuilt the structure in the first place.

[ZippyTheChimp]

What incentive would the owners have for doing it?

[Alonzo-ny]

Oh i get your diagram more now, it is physically possible but i dont see why they would want to do that rather than build a seperate tower.

[TREPYE]

These towers need an upgrade so $$ needs to be spent anyways on bringing it up to date. And they, in essence, could have half to a third of a new building's structure already up saving construction costs.

[ZippyTheChimp]

^
Why do they need an upgrade? I thought they were fully leased.

[TREPYE]

Because all towers eventually need to be udgraded and by the time MSG is gone they will be dated. Why not kill two birds with one stone? Upgrade + increase lease space.

[ZippyTheChimp]

^
That far in the future, if they're structurally outdated, I think it would be more cost effective to demolish them. Just making them bigger doesn't necessarily upgrade them.

[ablarc]

Tearrr 'em down. Massing's all wrong. Problem goes deeper than the skin.

[TREPYE]

Tearrr 'em down. Massing's all wrong. Problem goes deeper than the skin.
That is the obvious choice as far as Im concerned in terms of appeal. But since develpers cannot think like this they think $$ first and foremost I was hoping that there was some sort of financialy feasable way to coerce them into eliminating 1,2 PP as the POS's that we know them to be today and morph them something/anything that could be potentially more appealing.

Zip, is it really cheaper to knock something down and build it up again when you can just work off an existing structure? I figured my idea was the cheaper way to go.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Zip, is it really cheaper to knock something down and build it up again when you can just work off an existing structure? I figured my idea was the cheaper way to go.If it's an economic consideration, the choice would not come up. From the owner's viewpoint, you're inventing the problem.

From an aesthetic viewpoint, I agree with ablarc.

What you're suggesting is sort of what happened at Verizon. The company didn't need all the space, so the building was an economic liability and they sold it. For the new owner, it was more cost effective to renovate the building than tear it down. If the building was a 1930s unlandmarked office building, they would have torn it down.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Moynihan Developers Court Homeland Security Cash

by Matthew Schuerman | December 18, 2007

The state economic development agency and the private developers behind Moynihan Station have targeted an unlikely pot of money to help build the proposed $3 billion transit center in midtown west: homeland security dollars.

“This is a logical place for people to invest homeland dollars,” said James Dyer, a Washington, D.C.-based lobbyist who is representing Vornado Realty Trust and the Related Companies, the two firms that formed a joint venture to redevelop the Farley Post Office into Moynihan Station. “Anytime you have a station carrying more people through it that go through the airports at any one time, you obviously are going to have security concerns.”

The developers paid Mr. Dyer’s firm, Clark & Weinstock, $220,000 in the first half of the year to lobby the Department of Homeland Security as well as other more obvious targets, such as Amtrak and the Department of Transportation, according to federal lobbying records.

The $865 million proposed conversion of the Farley Post Office, at 33rd Street and Eighth Avenue, into a train station had been fully funded when the Pataki administration approved it last year. But that proposal was never finalized because the developers proposed a far broader, and expensive, plan that involves moving Madison Square Garden and redoing Penn Station underneath.

The new Penn Station, dubbed Moynihan East, could cost as much as $2 billion, according to rough estimates. In addition to the $450 million that the developers have reportedly committed, the state is expected to contribute more and also seek funds from the city and the federal government, including the Homeland Security Department. The fund amounts aren’t yet clear.

“We do believe that we can make the case that federal transportation funding, homeland security funding and historic preservation tax credits are all appropriate sources of funding for this project,” Patrick J. Foye, the co-chairman of the Empire State Development Corporation, said. “I think with 550,000 New York and New Jersey residents going through this facility every day as a key regional and national transportation hub, that it would be entirely appropriate for the federal government to contribute homeland security funds.”

Tom Schatz, the president of Citizens Against Government Waste, a private nonpartisan watchdog organization based in Washington, said that the lobbying activity at the federal level indicates that the developers are seeking special earmarks for the project. The Homeland Security Department gives to few of these so-called pork projects, he said, distributing its money instead in lump sums to states and cities to divvy up, or to particular types of security operations, such as screening cargo that arrives by ship.

Mr. Schatz said that it would distort the purpose of homeland security funding if money was used to build a new train station.

“After the facility is completed, there might be some money available for security operations,” he said. “But if [the] Homeland Security [Department] becomes a builder and starts supporting construction, almost anything can be built with homeland security money. That is a big concern because that takes money away from causes that are more crucial for protecting homeland security, such as protecting the ports, protecting the borders, screening passengers in airports.”
http://www.observer.com/2007/moynihan-developers-court-homeland-security-cash

Copyright © 2007 The New York Observer.

[Derek2k3]

http://ny.metro.us/metro/local/article/Operation_Santa_may_collide_with_transit_hub/11209.html

'Operation Santa' may collide with transit hub

by amy zimmer / metro new york

DEC 21, 2007

MIDTOWN. The letters that pour into the James A. Farley Post Office for “Operation Santa Claus” are overwhelmingly from kids or parents facing hard times. They ask for gifts such as gloves, video games or, as one recent writer desired, “magic dust.”

Their letters, addressed to the North Pole, end up here. They’re opened by postal employees, separated by location and made available for New Yorkers willing to act on Santa’s behalf. But some people worry about the future of Operation Santa — which received more than 500,000 letters last year — once the post office becomes the new Moynihan Station transit hub with Madison Square Garden.

“The idea to get people in this hard-hearted city to do this in the Christmas season for kids who aren’t getting much under the tree is moving,” said Kent Barwick, president of the Municipal Art Society, which is hoping to convince the Empire State Development Corp., the state agency overseeing the project, to retain the post office’s retail functions in the lobby of the new station. “What we hear is MSG felt it would be a nice place to sell tickets,” Barwick said. But the post office “is not just a great building, it’s a great institution.”

The state’s environmental impact statement for the project said the post office’s retail functions in the lobby — where Operation Santa is run — may be relocated. The ESDC is also studying an alternative to such a move.

“We would never be the Grinch who stole Christmas,” ESDC spokesman Warner Johnston said. “It’s not going to be a 365-day Operation Santa, but we’ll continue the tradition as it exists today.”

Operation Santa is the oldest and largest program of its kind in the country. Roughly 18 workers handle letters from children such as sixth-grader Yanellis, who invited Santa to have cookies and asked for a “mini lap top” for “my studies” — something her mother couldn’t buy since she lost her job and “is disable with asthama bad [sic].”

Post office spokeswoman Patricia McGovern was hopeful the program would continue. “It’s been going for 80 years,” she said.

[lofter1]

That ^ is a good club that could be used to nudge the Dolan clan.

[expose05]

They should renovate the Macys store then gutt the inside of it and put a Nordstrom in it. (Wishful Thinking:p)

[lofter1]

A new(-ish) sign has gone up on Eighth Avenue below W. 33rd Street ...

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p242/Lofter1/MSG%20Farley/Farley_03a4.jpg

farley

[lofter1]

Miracle on 32nd Street


Editorial


NY TIMES (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/28/opinion/28fri4.html)
December 28, 2007

After more than a decade of dreaming, it may still take a miracle to build a new Pennsylvania Station in New York City. The odds would increase if Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s development team presented their proposal to the public as soon as possible. Then everyone — especially the people who use the station — could push to make this much-needed project happen.


Pennsylvania Station is now the busiest rail station in the country. It also ranks among the dreariest public facilities anywhere. Members of a group called Friends of Moynihan Station (http://www.moynihanstation.org/newsite/) recently went there to distribute sketches of plans to rebuild the station and name it for the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan. It was like handing out a flagon of holiday cheer to downtrodden commuters who had no idea there was a possibility for something better.


To get the public involved, Governor Spitzer’s development team, led by Patrick Foye, will have to unveil their plans for the project, as long promised. Once details are aired, commuters and others should make sure that this private-public partnership gives the public its due. One worry is that the James A. Farley Post Office building — the site for part of the new station and a grand example of Beaux-Arts architecture — is properly preserved when Madison Square Garden also moves inside.


In recent days, some of the planners have hinted at another possibility. They talked about transplanting Macy’s into the section of the new Moynihan station that would be east of Eighth Avenue. At this point, this move seems like another complication for a project that is already about as complex as public works can get. For one thing, the old Macy’s building has national landmark status and needs to be protected. Also, moving Macy’s to 32nd Street raises new questions about whether that part of the Moynihan complex would become more shopping mall than railroad station.


There are still many threads that need to be woven together. Right now, there are important negotiations going on about how to pay for the project, and whether the state, city and developers are contributing enough to pull in the necessary federal funds. If such negotiations must continue behind doors, that still does not mean the state and the developers can delay letting the public see detailed plans and proposals. Veteran commuters deserve some hope that the new Moynihan complex is not just another urban fantasy.


Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

[RandySavage]

Came upon these sickening before and after images:

Old Penn
http://www.geocities.com/exploring_citr/penn/conc_nw.jpg

http://www.geocities.com/exploring_citr/penn/wait_n.jpg

New Penn
http://www.geocities.com/exploring_citr/penn/mainarea.jpg

[ramvid01]

^^ Was this caused by a death-ray too? :rolleyes::confused:

[arcman210]

^^ Was this caused by a death-ray too? :rolleyes::confused:

no it was caused by a controlled demolition ;)

[Derek2k3]

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2255/2091846557_aff35e1163_b.jpg

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2054/2071879706_f37ccca330_b.jpg

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2092/2091857451_52ab66395b_b.jpg

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2174/2071096391_37c1c5cf16_b.jpg
robjohnston (http://www.flickr.com/photos/robjohnston/)

[BrooklynRider]

Gee, they really know how to draw a crowd. :rolleyes:

[Dynamicdezzy]

Hmmm, if NJ transit is thinking of having their new tunnel terminating below Macys and Macys is thinking of relocating or moving part of their 34th st location to Moynihan, would it be better to have the the basement and 1st floor or 2 gutted and renovated as a train station to itself? NJT was thinking of eventually extending this same tunnel to Grand central terminal, so would it also make sense to have this 3rd (macy's) station as a west side terminal for Metro north??? Moynihan/Penn would Serve Amtrak, Lirr and NJT; Macy's would serve NJT and Metro north; Grand central would serve Metro north, Lirr and NJT.

[lofter1]

Plus, such a deal ^ would solve any branding problem for the new train hub ...

Macy's Station

:cool:

[Dynamicdezzy]

I apologize as always for a terrible drawing, but it serves its purpose.


http://img113.imageshack.us/img113/4990/sstationts1.png (http://imageshack.us)


This image shows the connections at the 3 Station/Terminals, with "Macy's Station" (Very Nice Lofter) serving as the newly formed terminal-Station for NJ Transit and Metro North.

Metro North can access this station via the Empire Connection, Sunnyside yards and/or tunnel extension from GCT.

[STT757]

The NJ Transit Tunnel is not going under Macy's, it's going under 34th street. And there are plans now for an extension to Grand Central, that could be visited in the future.

[ManhattanKnight]

January 7, 2008
Political Memo

http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/4655/taxscareys8.jpg
Seth Wenig/Associated Press

Knicks fans at Madison Square Garden last month. The Garden has been exempt from city property taxes since 1982.

A Tax Scare at the Garden, Among Other Worries

By RAY RIVERA

These are not halcyon days for Madison Square Garden. The Knicks are rapidly affirming their place as the most uninspired team in basketball. Their coach, Isiah Thomas, is greeted nightly by a chorus of boos.

And back-to-back sexual harassment lawsuits, one played out in sordid detail in a Manhattan courtroom before ending in an $11.5 million judgment, have made the once-proud arena, which owns the Knicks, and its chairman, James L. Dolan, easy targets for the tabloids — and for City Hall.

For the third time in five years, the City Council is considering a resolution calling on the State Legislature to end the Koch-era exemptions that, since 1982, have freed the arena from paying city property taxes, estimated at $11 million to $12 million a year.

City Council members pushed identical resolutions in 2003 and 2005. But without the support of the Council’s speaker at the time, Gifford Miller, neither came to a vote. Things are different this year.

The Knicks, Mr. Thomas and Mr. Dolan are at a nadir in popularity. The city’s budget writers are forecasting a downturn in the economy. And more important, the tax-exemption proposal, for the first time, has the support of the city’s top two officials: Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and Mr. Miller’s successor as speaker, Christine C. Quinn.

The Council’s Finance Committee will hold its first hearing on the new resolution on Monday. But some council members have already made their feelings clear. At a full Council meeting last month, two members prominently displayed “Fire Isiah!” signs on the front panels of their desks. They might as well have read, “End the giveaway.”

“I just think clearly the Garden has lost its direction,” said Councilman Leroy G. Comrie Jr., a Democrat from Queens, and one of the two council members who posted the signs. “Management is not connected to the needs of the city anymore.”

The resolution, if it passes the full Council, would have to be followed by legislation in Albany, where Cablevision, the politically savvy owner of the Garden, has had a powerful ally in the past in the Assembly’s speaker, Sheldon Silver. In 2005, Mr. Silver helped Cablevision quash Mr. Bloomberg’s plan to build a stadium for the New York Jets on the West Side that the Garden viewed as potential competition. Mr. Silver’s former chief of staff Patricia Lynch is among the high-powered lobbyists Cablevision has hired to stop the new resolution.

Mr. Silver’s office declined to comment on the tax-exemption issue until the City Council’s resolution is put before him.

Although council members say they would never tie their tax fight to the Knicks’ performance on the court — the team’s 8-24 record is the third worst in the National Basketball Association — the Garden’s battered corporate reputation has not helped its cause.

In addition to the sexual harassment suits — one by a former Knicks executive that led to the $11.5 million judgment, and another by an ex-cheerleader for the New York Rangers who settled out of court — The Daily News recently hammered the arena for charging the city $110,000, including $4,000 for confetti, to hold the police academy’s graduation ceremonies. (Garden officials say that the services were provided at cost and that they made no profit.)

“I’m not going to be so flippant as to say that the fact the Knicks have absolutely stunk up the basketball court is a reason to get rid of their tax exemption,” said Councilman Lewis A. Fidler, one of the proposal’s sponsors. “But I think certainly the manner in which they’ve conducted their business otherwise has certainly left people feeling less than warm and fuzzy for them.”

He added, “It has perhaps created an environment in which people are willing to pile on.”

The Garden negotiated its current tax deal when the city’s morale was in the depths. Crime was high. The 1970s fiscal crisis was fresh on the public’s mind. And the Garden, then a subsidiary of the Gulf and Western Corporation, was threatening to move the Knicks and the Rangers, the National Hockey League franchise that it also owns, out of the city to escape high tax, labor and energy costs.

Edward I. Koch, who was mayor at the time, said he believed that the exemptions would end after 10 years. Instead, the State Legislature, which granted the exemptions, kept the breaks in place for as long as the Knicks and the Rangers continued to play their home games at the Garden.

Mr. Koch has long since said the exemptions should end.

“I doubt the teams would leave now,” Mr. Koch said, “even without the tax breaks.”

The Garden’s officials are trying to compare their deal with those recently granted to the Yankees and the Mets for their new stadiums and to the New Jersey Nets for an arena that will bring the team to Brooklyn. Those publicly owned venues, built by the teams or developers and leased back to them, will not be subject to property taxes either. Instead, the city will get annual payments in lieu of taxes, but that money will be used to pay off the tax-free bonds that are financing the projects instead of going into the general fund.

According to figures that the Garden plans to present at the Council hearing on Monday, the Yankees, Mets and Nets deals amount to nearly $1.4 billion in government subsidies over 40 years, including $230 million in property tax exemptions. Those numbers are drawn from estimates made by the city’s Independent Budget Office, and do not include subsidies for a Metro-North station and parking garages to be built at the new Yankee Stadium, which is scheduled to open in 2009.

Officials at the Garden say they have reached out to the mayor for support and plan more discussions with him. In a statement, the Garden singled out Ms. Quinn.

“With a more than $50 billion city annual operating budget, it is strange that Speaker Quinn would focus on M.S.G.’s abatement, which pales in comparison to the more than a billion dollars in benefits recently granted to all other pro sports teams in New York City,” Barry Watkins, a Garden spokesman, said.
Ms. Quinn said the Garden was disingenuous to compare its deals with those of the other teams.

The Garden’s “tax break was given back in the 1980s to keep the teams from leaving, not as part of an expansion” or new construction, Ms. Quinn said.
Ms. Quinn and Mr. Fidler said they did not want to be unfair to the Garden, which is considering building a new arena across Eighth Avenue from the current arena site. If that happens, they said, the Garden would be welcome to negotiate new incentives.

But, Ms. Quinn said, after more than two decades, “we have more than appropriately compensated them for staying in the city.”

Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

[ZippyTheChimp]

Ms. Quinn said the Garden was disingenuous to compare its deals with those of the other teams.

The Garden’s “tax break was given back in the 1980s to keep the teams from leaving, not as part of an expansion” or new construction, Ms. Quinn said.But she doesn't say why those deals were given to the other teams, if not to keep them from leaving the city. Why was it necessary to fund new construction of private property?

If there's a new MSG, I wonder how much of the cost we're going to get stuck paying for.

[lofter1]

... the City Council is considering a resolution calling on the State Legislature to end the Koch-era exemptions that, since 1982, have freed the arena from paying city property taxes, estimated at $11 million to $12 million a year ...

The resolution, if it passes the full Council, would have to be followed by legislation in Albany, where Cablevision, the politically savvy owner of the Garden, has had a powerful ally in the past in the Assembly’s speaker, Sheldon Silver. In 2005, Mr. Silver helped Cablevision quash Mr. Bloomberg’s plan to build a stadium for the New York Jets on the West Side that the Garden viewed as potential competition. Mr. Silver’s former chief of staff Patricia Lynch is among the high-powered lobbyists Cablevision has hired to stop the new resolution.

Mr. Silver’s office declined to comment on the tax-exemption issue until the City Council’s resolution is put before him ...

... Edward I. Koch, who was mayor at the time, said he believed that the exemptions would end after 10 years. Instead, the State Legislature, which granted the exemptions, kept the breaks in place for as long as the Knicks and the Rangers continued to play their home games at the Garden.

If a bill moves forward to end the exemptions and Silver blocks it then he will have a lot of 'splainin' to do ...

[Eugenious]

If a bill moves forward to end the exemptions and Silver blocks it then he will have a lot of 'splainin' to do ...

To whom? not like he is accountable to anybody but the people lining his pockets (Dolans, Related co. etc..)

As long as Silver is there, nothing is going to happen to Dolan's sweet exemption or MSG or midtown re-building etc...everything will stay the same for many years to come thanks to Mr. Sheldon Silver.

in a few years when the next mayor will try to take away Dolan's free money, Shellie will be there to block, delay, and make it impossible to do anything just as he always has....Shellie always comes through, be it West Side Stadium, Moynihan Station, or the MSG exemption...

[ablarc]

Shellie always comes through, be it West Side Stadium, Moynihan Station, or the MSG exemption...
Ol' Faithful.

[TonyO]

Moynihan Project To Go Forward, Despite Shortfall

By PETER KIEFER
Staff Reporter of the Sun
February 13, 2008

Despite a financing shortage of more than $1 billion, Governor Spitzer is assuring New Yorkers that the Moynihan Station development project will not suffer the same fate as the now defunct plan to expand the Javits Convention Center.

At a press conference yesterday, Mr. Spitzer said "real progress" was being made in the planned overhaul of Pennsylvania Station, which would require relocating Madison Square Garden to the western side of the neighboring Farley Post Office building.

"The difference is we are managing this in a very different way; whereas the Javits discussion was discussed many, many years ago and never really got to the point of closure, with people agreeing on a plan and hence dealing with the question of finances. Here we are very close," Mr. Spitzer said.

"We feel very comfortable that we are making real progress and will be able to match each of the targets that has been laid out there," he said.

The governor's comments came a day after the chairman of Empire State Development Corporation, Patrick Foye, testified to the state Assembly's Committee on Corporations, Authorities and Commissions that the budget for the $2.3 billion project was still being pieced together.

Mr. Foye said he hoped to get more funding from the developers, the Related Companies and Vornado Realty Trust, along with more city, state, and federal funds.

Mr. Foye said the funding shortfall was at least $1 billion.

[DarrylStrawberry]

Plan to Rebuild Penn Station Area May Be Close to Failure

By CHARLES V. BAGLI (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/b/charles_v_bagli/index.html?inline=nyt-per)
Published: February 23, 2008

The sweeping $14 billion proposal to transform Pennsylvania Station and the district around it is in danger of collapse because of the softening economy, shortfalls in government financing, political inertia and daunting logistical problems, government officials and real estate executives involved in the project said this week.

The proposed project, known as Moynihan Station, calls for building half a dozen skyscrapers, relocating Madison Square Garden one block away and constructing a monumental new train station on 34th Street, between Seventh and Eighth Avenues. Civic groups, developers and government officials have embraced the plan as an act of civic redemption for the demolition of the original Penn Station in the 1960s, saying it will also create a first-class business district around the nation’s busiest rail hub.

But the project has grown in size and complexity, and the estimated cost of the new station has tripled, to $3 billion. There is squabbling between developers, the Garden, government officials, community groups and preservationists over the designs and how much the public would benefit. And now negotiations have stalled, despite three years of planning and lobbying in Albany and Washington, the officials and executives said. Those people spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid inflaming state officials.

Proponents of the plan, who view the $14 billion project as a rare opportunity to refurbish Penn Station and revitalize the district, say they still hope that Gov. Eliot Spitzer (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/eliot_l_spitzer/index.html?inline=nyt-per) will be able to drag it back from the edge of failure. In an interview Friday, Mr. Spitzer said he was committed to the Moynihan project, which he contends is critical to the future of the city.

Officials say the governor plans to meet next week with the developers behind the project — Stephen M. Ross of Related Companies and Steven Roth of Vornado Realty Trust — and the owners of Madison Square Garden in an effort to resolve major financing issues.

But the developers, who have spent more than $50 million on the planning effort, and the Garden have grown weary of the slow pace of progress, the executives said.

The project’s linchpin, moving Madison Square Garden one block west to the Farley Post Office, may fall out of place. Frustrated by the delays and rising costs, Madison Square Garden has revived plans to renovate the 30-year-old arena instead of relocating. Garden officials have told real estate executives and civic leaders that they plan to announce the renovation plans in early March.

During discussions in December, Garden executives, developers and government officials agreed that if they did not make progress over the next two months, they would part ways, according to two people who have been briefed on the talks. Garden officials did not attend a scheduled planning meeting on Thursday.

The plan to build a grand train station and erect the skyscrapers was always dependent on the demolition of the current Garden, the brown doughnut-like structure that sits over the crowded corridors of Penn Station, where the station would be built. More than 550,000 passengers pass through the station every day.

Some government officials involved in reviewing the project contend that the Garden’s threat to renovate could be a bargaining posture intended to gain concessions on the design of the new arena in the Farley Post Office. Those officials say that the state and the city have leverage over the Garden, which would need a variety of state and city approvals to renovate the arena.

In any event, the governor said Friday that he was highly confident that his deal was going ahead.

“It’s a critical investment for Midtown,” Mr. Spitzer said in a telephone interview. “This, in conjunction with Hudson Yards, where we have taken a vacant piece of land and now have five competing bids to add 12 million square feet of commercial and residential space, will redefine Midtown Manhattan.”

The governor was referring to the pending sale of the development rights over the West Side railyards, which sit three blocks west of Penn Station, from 30th to 33rd Street, between 10th and 12th Avenues. The second round of bids for the development rights are due Tuesday.

Some government officials and real estate executives are concerned that a slowing economy and the current state of the credit markets, where there is little money available for large real estate deals, could cause problems for both the sale of the railyards and the Moynihan project.

The Spitzer administration can ill afford a setback for either project, urban planners say, after its announcement in January that it had significantly cut back its plans to expand the nearby Jacob K. Javits Convention Center.

“We’re convinced that this is the key catalyst to West Side development,” said Robert D. Yaro, president of the Regional Plan Association (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/r/regional_plan_assn/index.html?inline=nyt-org), a supporter of the Moynihan project. “It’s got lots of moving parts, and they’re not meshing well. But there’s so much money to be made by everyone and there’s so much in the public interest. It’s essential that we get it done and we get it right.”

One of the key issues for the Moynihan project is the cost of building a new train station, whose estimated price has grown to $3 billion from $1 billion. (The station would be named after the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/m/daniel_patrick_moynihan/index.html?inline=nyt-per), who first suggested turning the Farley Post Office into a new Penn Station.) The negotiations involve state and city officials and officials from the Long Island Rail Road, New Jersey Transit (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/n/new_jersey_transit/index.html?inline=nyt-org), Amtrak (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/amtrak/index.html?inline=nyt-org), two subway lines and the Port Authority.

Patrick J. Foye, co-chairman of the Empire State Development Corporation, said that the city and the state have each pledged to invest $300 million in the station, and that the developers have agreed to put up $550 million. The developers, in turn, would get valuable development rights to build skyscrapers in the surrounding area.

That would be especially tantalizing for Mr. Roth, whose company already owns a major portion of the neighborhood, including the Hotel Pennsylvania and No. 1 and No. 2 Penn Plaza.

“Significant progress on the Moynihan project has been realized, but there are significant challenges yet to be resolved,” Mr. Foye said Friday.

But even if the developers can whittle the cost of the station by several hundred million dollars, there is a serious shortfall. Both government officials and the developers are hoping that they can obtain what is essentially a matching grant of $800 million from the federal government, a figure that Congressional officials say may be unrealistically high.

There are also a raft of design issues, ranging from what the new Penn Station would look like to how a new arena for the Garden would fit into the Farley Post Office. The developers have proposed inserting 1.2 million square feet of shops and department stores into the station, which critics say would turn the building into a shopping mall rather than a monumental train station like Grand Central Terminal.

The Garden, which signed a nonbinding agreement with the developers in February 2006, would essentially trade its current site between Seventh and Eighth Avenues to the developers for a new $1 billion arena within the walls of the state-owned post office, a landmark building between Eighth and Ninth Avenues.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/02/23/nyregion/23moy.600.jpg
A proposal would replace Madison Square Garden, on the left, with towers and turn the Farley Post Office, at right, into a train station and a rebuilt Garden.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/02/23/nyregion/23moy2.pop.jpg
The Farley Post Office on Eighth Avenue would house a new Garden as well as a new, monumental version of Penn Station.

[ablarc]

Plan to Rebuild Penn Station Area May Be Close to Failure...

The sweeping $14 billion proposal to transform Pennsylvania Station and the district around it is in danger of collapse because of the softening economy, shortfalls in government financing, political inertia and daunting logistical problems...
If they had gone ahead with the modest and small-incremental scheme to just turn part of Farley into a station, it would be close to completion by now.

But, no ... everybody had to fold it into big ideas! Now we'll end up with NOTHING for a decade or two.

TOLD YA SO ! !



(Sorry to say.)

[pianoman11686]

Ditto. (Hate to say it.)

[GVNY]

Ablarc, with all due respect, if this project had gone through and was at last erected, wouldn't that have placed you into the sensible projects crowd as opposed to the crazy pipe-dream few?

Of course, it did not 'go through,' and you were right all along.

[pianoman11686]

^It would have put me in the "sensible projects crowd" as well.

The reason I was against this new, bigger plan, back when it was first proposed (October 2006 I believe) was that it put Moynihan Station back on the shelf. We had waited long enough already to get the station underway. No matter what would happen to MSG/the old Penn/the annex of the Post Office, construction should have been started right away on the Post Office to ensure that, at the least, that piece of the puzzle was solved. That's what started the whole plan, and now they're telling us even Moynihan might not get done? Phooey.

As far as I'm concerned, the "crazy pipedream" chewed up and spit out the one really important, unalterable piece of the project.

[ablarc]

wouldn't that have placed you into the sensible projects crowd as opposed to the crazy pipe-dream few?
Moynihan Junior was crazy pipedream enough for this situation in this milieu. They had a bird in the hand, and they went for about 22 in the bush.

Sometimes things are best done incrementally. This was such an occasion.

[brianac]

Dolans Putting Moynihan Station Plan In Doubt


by Eliot Brown (http://www.observer.com/2007/author/eliot-brown) | February 22, 2008


http://observer.cast.advomatic.com/files/imagecache/article/files/moynihanstation2.jpg Related Companies.
An earlier Moynihan Station proposal, with a moved Madison Square Garden in the back.

Things don’t seem to be all that peachy these days in the planning process for a multi-billion-dollar redevelopment of Penn Station, to be known as Moynihan Station.

The plan for the project hinges on the Dolan family’s Madison Square Garden moving to the back of the neighboring Farley Post Office building (http://www.nyc-architecture.com/MID/MID133.htm), clearing the way to redo Penn Station, along with adding a concourse in the Farley building.

Though, in recent weeks, advocates, community members and others involved with the process have expressed increasing concern that the Garden could throw a wrench in the whole process, said to be frustrated by the slow-moving bureaucracy and the intransigence of preservationists who are concerned about major alterations to the historic Farley building.

In a meeting yesterday with community groups, advocacy groups, the state and project developers, representatives from Madison Square Garden were curiously absent from the gathering, part of a federal process known as Section 106 that deals with alterations to historic buildings. When the developers’ project manager, Vishaan Chakrabarti, was asked about the Garden’s absence, he said the Dolans had decided not to be part of the Section 106 process, according to a person at the meeting and two people familiar with his remarks. Mr. Chakrabarti also said at the meeting that he was hoping they would join the process in future meetings.

The Garden has received strong resistance from preservationists who do not want to see major alterations that would affect the character of the Farley building; of particular concern to preservationists is a courtyard wall that the Garden wants to replace with a large glass wall. The Garden wants to put its arena in the western portion of Farley, with the glass wall serving as a grand entrance to the facility.

Real Estate Weekly reported this week that the Garden has engaged its architects to prepare renovation plans for the existing arena, an alternative the Garden has always said it is considering in lieu of a move.

The discord has worried some involved with the process, causing concern that the extraordinarily complex project could unravel if progress is not made.

“It feels like it’s kind of on a knife’s edge right now—there’s very little margin of error,” said Tom Wright, the executive director at the Regional Plan Association (http://www.rpa.org/). “The state needs to be creating a process that brings people to the table and figures out how to hammer out a compromise.”

If the Garden did pull out of the project, it would invite a return to late 2006, when the Pataki administration wanted to push through an expansion of the train station into the Farley building, leaving the existing Penn Station as is.

Such a move would be a major disappointment to city, state and elected officials and to the developers, the Related Companies and Vornado Realty Trust, who have devoted countless hours and tens of millions of dollars into the plan thus far—a plan that would create, both directly and indirectlly, billions of dollars of surrounding new development.

The city and state do not seem to be all that concerned, at least publicly.

“The Garden feels they need to protect themselves in the event that the project doesn’t’ happen, but we remain hopeful that we’re going to be able to strike a deal with the Garden,” said Seth Pinsky, the city's newly crowned Economic Development Corporation president.

A spokesman for the state’s Empire State Development Corporation, Warner Johnston, said there are issues yet to be resolved, but the state is committed to the project.

Also unclear is how much the project will get from the federal government. The state is seeking hundreds of millions from Washington, and without a very healthy serving of federal dollars, the whole project could be jeopardized.

Of course, all could be a show by the Dolans, as they would be giving up the chance for a new arena subsidized—effectively—by Moynihan Station developers Related and Vornado.

Then again, the Dolans do not have a reputation for being the city’s most predictable family.

A Garden spokesman declined to comment.

Copyright 2008 The New York Observer.

[lofter1]

Time to use eminent domain ...

Declare MSG and Penn Plaza a blight, do some creative accounting regarding the value (considering all the tax breaks the Dolan's have received) buy them out for a nickel on the dollar (or better yet dig into their finances and find some irregularities to knock he price down even lower) and move forward without this bunch of "what-good-do-they-do?" schmucks to get in the way of Moynihan / New MSG.

[DarrylStrawberry]

this bunch of "what-good-do-they-do?" schmucks

I couldn't agree more.

[arcman210]

like i said when i first joined the forum, the developers and their pipe dreams would wind up putting the entire project at risk of complete failure.

msg knows and have always known that they have no reason to move the most successful, and highest grossing arena, in the world unless it they dont have to pay for it. its much easier for them to spend $250mil to renovate the existing garden than it has ever been to build a new one for 5 times as much. getting them involved as a key component with the moynihan project was the end all for this project.

just build moynihan on its own already. the farley annex will always be there waiting.

[ZippyTheChimp]

What is repeatedly missed here is that the Moynihan Station will not solve the problems of Penn Station, and this will not be a phased development unless the Dolans and MSG are included at the outset.

MSG sits on one of the two best sites for an arena on Manhattan. It is very successful, and not many that go there give a damn how it looks on the outside. They don't have to go anywhere.

If they are not included in the plans, the only thing that will be built is the Moynihan Station. MSG would be renovated in place, and Penn Station will remain a basement for the next 30-40 years.

If you want a station that 70% of the commuters won't use, then by all means, build the Moynihan now.

In my opinion, this is very shortsighted. The opportunity to get MSG off the back of Penn Station will not come again for a long time.

[ablarc]

^ Well, in post #1996, lofter has a plan...

[ZippyTheChimp]

It's good in theory, but getting them out of there via that route might be difficult. I suspect much of this has to do with the ongoing animosity between the Dolans and Bloomie.

Or maybe they're just busy now with the Knicks drive to the playoffs. :p

[Citytect]

I agree Zippy. MSG has to be relocated before Penn Station can ever truly be reclaimed. It's an issue that needed to be addressed. And even if this attempt to get MSG out of the way doesn't pan out, I don't think it was unwise to give it a shot. It will be a very very long time before we have this much bargaining power to entice the Dolans to move their arena.

At this point, I think it's too early for the "I told you so" comments, and I don't find it regretful we didn't take the so-called incremental approach for two main reasons. 1) I think the Farley conversion is still possible even if the larger scheme falls through. 2) For Penn Station ever to be revitalized incrementally, we have to at some point deal with the real problem: Madison Square Garden. Even if it take several attempts to resolve the problem, it's important that we try every chance we get, because there will only be one increment if the arena is never moved. And how can you call something incremental if there is only one increment?

Furthermore, there never was an incremental plan. The initial plan for Farley conversion into Moynihan Station, was a one-step plan. There wasn't a larger plan that called for converting Farley Post Office into Moynihan Station and then moving MSG at a time in the future and building a new station that serves the majority of the passengers at the site of the current station. There wasn't a master plan that provided for that possibility. And parts of the smaller plan were in conflict with future expansion into a grander plan for all of Penn Station. An intermodal hall, for example, was planned in space that MSG would have required if moved into the Farley Annex.

[ablarc]

Furthermore, there never was an incremental plan.
Oxymoron. You probably mean a phased plan.


The initial plan for Farley conversion into Moynihan Station, was a one-step plan.
Thats right, an incremental process is not knowing or caring what will follow you. Most often, subsequent actions are taken by different entities. The outcome of such a process is often pretty good; most of New York is a testament to its excellence.

Jane Jacobs liked this way of doing things. Small steps, often not co-ordinated.


And parts of the smaller plan were in conflict with future expansion into a grander plan for all of Penn Station.
Those are exactly the kinds of conflicts and contradictions that lead to the anomalous complexities we admire in cities. Sharpens the design faculties of those who have to deal with it. Tabula rasa gives you Hudson Yards (not much admired).

Robert Moses liked tabula rasa.

[Citytect]

ablarc, there is a time and place for incremental development. This isn't it. When the busiest train station in the nation is a depressing series of confusing subterranean corridors, I think working out a larger plan to transform the whole complex is the best solution. It doesn't need to happen at once, but a comprehensive plan is needed.

You still have to face the fact that MSG has to be dealt with at some point.

Tabula rasa also gave us Rockefeller Center. It doesn't always end poorly.

Jacobs good. Moses bad. Therefore we should have just gone with the small plan that wouldn't have served the majority of the stations users. Did I get that right? Anything is always better than nothing, no matter how bad or insufficient that anything is. Seems like a common theme for you.