At the very end of Bloomberg’s term as mayor, the city unveiled plans to transform a vacant city-owned tract in the Melrose neighborhood of the South Bronx into a million-square-foot affordable housing complex known as La Central. Now a new building application has been filed for the first part of the project, a nine-story supportive housing development at 626 Bergen Avenue.
Property owner Yidel Hirsch has filed applications for a four-story, 20-unit residential building spanning the lots of 193-197 Freeman Street, six blocks north of the Greenpoint Avenue stop on the G train. The building will measure 20,000 square feet, which means units will average 750 square feet each. Julien Flander is the applicant of record, and a single-story warehouse must first be demolished.
Tomorrow, Argent Ventures will go before the Planning Board for approval of their planned 980-unit mixed-use development at 180 Baldwin Avenue, in Jersey City’s Journal Square. Two buildings will rise to seven stories on Baldwin Avenue, and two 25-story towers will stand behind those, according to The Jersey Journal. The project will feature ground-floor retail space, and public plazas are also planned. A four-story, 300,000 square-foot former factory must first be demolished, and Marchetto Higgins Stieve is designing.
The half-century-old Landmarks law has played a valuable role in protecting the historic fabric of New York City’s neighborhoods, but it also limits the production of housing—particularly affordable housing—in neighborhoods with large historic districts.
Amit Stern, head of LHUM Investments, has filed applications for a four-story, eight-unit residential building measuring 5,490 square feet at the vacant lot of 71 Cooper Street, in southern Bushwick. Located two blocks from the J and Z train’s Chauncey Street subway stop, units will average just 685 square feet, indicative of rentals. Woody Chen’s InFocus is the applicant of record.
