57 Reade Street - 281 Broadway - 20 story tower (TriBeCa) - By SLCE

[londonlawyer]

Thanks. Hopefully, it won't survive the next boom.

[ShaMegro]

I'd guess the plan is similar to what was done with the "interior courtyard" at 88 Leonard; create an open space at the SW corner of the lot at mid-block (at the upper left of the site as seen in the plot map at this post).

That makes sense. Though I think an optimal setup for this particular lot would look more like what the developers of the Harrison did on the UWS and incorporated two buidlings, instead of one large one that wrapped around an existing corner structure.
http://wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=10026

The lot would've been better served with a larger building facing Broadway, and a separate one on Reade street that incorporate the lot next to the creamy landmark, as well as LL's hated spaghetti western building.

[lofter1]

A larger building facing Broadway would totally obscure the north face of Cass Gilbert's Broadway-Chambers Building. The violation upon that one which the current plan will inflict is already enough. No need to wish for more.

[Derek2k3]

Surprised to see that this is now above ground.

[lofter1]

Sad to hear. Better that this block of glass never made it off the page.

[Merry]

Leaning Tower of Broadway's Troublesome New Neighbor Surfaces

October 7, 2010, by Pete





The big hole at 279 Broadway, where a crazy erector set of supports has been propping up a precariously leaning historic structure for the past two years (across the street from the Department of Buildings, no less), is finally seeing some action. A crane is parked at the corner of Reade and Broadway, right up close to 287 Broadway, one of the better examples of cast-iron architecture in the city. The new L-shaped, 20-story box of green glass from SLCE Architects, designed to wrap around the landmarked five-story building, has started to rise. It's been a long slog getting this one out of the ground.

The troubles here started back in November 2007 when excavation on this lot undermined the foundation of the old baroque beauty next door, forcing an immediate and now interminable evacuation. Engineers were brought in to construct bracing to keep the old gal from toppling over. Construction on the new building was put on hold while a system of supports was put in place. Eventually the foundation work began, but this summer a new problem arose, as detailed at DOB: "Due to concrete of insufficient streng [sic] being placed for eleven colums [sic] at the subcellar-cellar level, the columns must be removed and replaced." Yikes!

Apparently that subcellar snafu was repaired, as the first floor is now rising above street level along Broadway, butt-up against the old leaner to the north and Cass Gilbert's 1900 masterwork next door to the south at 273 Broadway. The original completion date for the stack of 84 condo units was tagged by SLCE at sometime in 2011, but that seems to have been set before the troubles took over. Whenever it's finished, 279 Broadway will join other notable new structures that are changing the face of downtown's main thoroughfare for the foreseeable future.

279 Broadway - New Building Application Details [DOB]
57 Reade [SLCE Architects]
287 Broadway coverage [Curbed]

http://ny.curbed.com/archives/2010/1...faces.php#more

[londonlawyer]

The masterpieces on either side of this POS deserve a better neighbor. The green glass looks ridiculous.

[Merry]

Leaning TriBeCa Tower Tenants Caught in Limbo

Tenants of 287 Broadway, in TriBeCa, forced to leave three years ago, hope to return to their landmarked building.

By Julie Shapiro





TRIBECA — Nearly three years have passed since Cora Cohen got an urgent phone call telling her to leave her loft at 287 Broadway, because the building was in danger of collapsing.

Since then, Cohen and her fellow tenants have been through innumerable ups and downs as they wait to learn the fate of their landmarked TriBeCa building, which has been leaning ever since.

"I really try not to think about that," said Cohen, an abstract painter who lived and worked in 287 Broadway for 35 years.

But now, an answer about the future of the building could finally be at hand.
Next to 287 Broadway, a long-delayed condo tower, whose excavation destabilized the building three years ago, is finally rising. As the development, called reade57, continues adding new floors, it is providing permanent support for 287 Broadway.

Soon, that support would mean that it was finally safe for the landlord of 287 Broadway to make the repairs the building needed to allow tenants to return, said Arlene Boop, Cohen’s lawyer.

The only remaining question is whether 287 Broadway’s landlord, Randall Co., intends to make those repairs.

Boop is seeking a court order requiring Randall to fix 287 Broadway, worried that the landlord will put off the work in hopes of getting rid of Cohen, who paid very low rent as a loft tenant. She said Randall had delayed submitting plans showing how the repair work would be done.

Lawyers for Randall, a company owned by Century 21’s Gindi family, did not return calls for comment.

In spite of the pending legal action, Boop said she was more optimistic about 287 Broadway’s future than she had been in years, since the 128-year-old building was likely no longer in danger of collapsing.

Cohen, though, said she wouldn’t get her hopes up until she had a solid guarantee that she could return.

From her new studio in Long Island City, Cohen described the uncertainty and turmoil of the first few weeks after the evacuation. As Christmas 2007 approached, Cohen stayed with friends and in hotels, without an inkling of how long she would be out of her home.

"It's just been really, really difficult financially and emotionally," she said last week.

Cohen was not the only person whose life was upended by the vacate order on Nov. 29, 2007. The building also housed at least one other residential tenant, several offices, a shoe repair shop and a pizza restaurant.

David Jaroslawicz, a lawyer representing the owners of the pizza shop, is still fighting for compensation from The John Buck Company, the developer of reade57. Since John Buck’s contractor was the one who destabilized 287 Broadway’s foundation, the company ought to pay damages, Jaroslawicz said.

"The developer of the project has fought tooth and nail to avoid paying anyone 10 cents," Jaroslawicz said in an e-mail last week. "There is no resolution and so long as the court permits the defendants to further delay this case from getting to trial, they will continue to stonewall."

Neil Khare, marketing strategist for The John Buck Company, declined to comment on the litigation.

Khare said the new 20-story reade57 development, designed by SLCE Architects, was scheduled to open with 84 condos in the fall of 2011.

The issues with 287 Broadway delayed reade57 and bumped up the costs, but John Buck had enough money to finish the project, Khare said.

"Both the design and quality of our project have not been affected in any way," he said in an e-mail. "reade57 is now on track to be a very positive addition to the TriBeCa skyline."

http://www.dnainfo.com/20101105/down...#ixzz14Udn4JoN

[MidtownGuy]

"It's just been really, really difficult financially and emotionally," she said last week.

Huh, I'll bet! chances are, she's now paying a normal rent for her "new studio in Long Island City"...when for decades she has probably been paying peanuts to live in that amazing TriBeCa building with giant sunlit arches up the wazoo.

[lofter1]

I can only imagine what the costs are to the developer to correct their "mistakes" here.

Some recent shots showing that the massive steel supports, erected to hold up the corner building while the new one finished the foundation dig out, are still in place and that the new one is rising around them. Once the new reinforced concrete is in place the steel will be cut out.

Along Broadway between Chambers & Reade, recently ...



About 6 months ago, before the new one started to rise, with the supporting structure fully visible ...



Steel hidden away within ...









A sneak peek of the first floor through the open construction shed door on Broadway ...



Along Reade Street, more of the same. Recently ...



Previously, the fully exposed supporting structure from Reade looking to the SE ...



The steel is now being surrounded by the reinforced concrete of the new floors ...





Big steel still within, holding up 55 Reade / 287 Broadway ...









*

[lofter1]

Those balconies projecting out over the sidewalk along both Broadway and Reade are ... just visually stupid.

[londonlawyer]

Is Spaghetti Western gone? That POS should be razed ASAP. As I recall, it's adjacent to another lowrise POS on Chambers St that houses, among other things, Carl's Steaks. (It may even be the same building that runs through the block from Reade to Chambers because it's the same height and equally filthy and ugly.)

If the A-hole from Chicago has ruined the Victorian building on B'Way, the city should make him rebuild it exactly as it was.

[Tectonic]

Very interesting stuff here. Thanks Lofter.

[BBMW]

I bet the owner of the cast iron was hoping that the contruction would collapse his building, so he could get rid of his stabilized tenants and build something bigger.

[londonlawyer]

Sadly, you're probably correct.