In a move poised to alter the Garment District along with parts of Flatiron and Chelsea, Mayor Eric Adams’ administration is targeting Midtown South as the first area where it’s flexing the city’s new powers to permit larger residential buildings than previously allowed.
At a Zoom information session Wednesday night to review the city’s plan to rezone 42 blocks between 23rd and 41st streets, between Fifth and Eighth avenues, the Department of City Planning is expected to announce that it is modifying its previously proposed plan for the area to take advantage of a new state law that allows the city to exceed a longstanding cap on the scale of new or renovated apartment buildings.
For decades, the so-called 12 floor-area-ratio, or FAR, cap has prohibited development any larger than 12 times the size of a building lot. The Department of City Planning will now propose that density in most of the area be increased to 18 FAR and the rest to 15 FAR.
This means buildings could be 25% or 50% larger than under the cap, enabling not only new construction but also reuse of longstanding industrial and office buildings — the kind of conversions that have transformed lower Manhattan into a mixed residential and office district.
Helping chances of passage through the City Council, the proposal already has the support of the local representatives, Erik Bottcher and Keith Powers.
If adopted, the change could produce as much as 9,700 new housing units, up from about 4,000 in the original proposal. Since the city’s mandatory inclusionary requirement will apply, the new housing could produce 2,800 apartments with permanently affordable below-market rents.
“Midtown South is one of the most transit- and job-rich areas of the city, but it’s long been held back by antiquated zoning that has restricted new housing. With action in Albany, we’re moving quickly to put new zoning tools to work to deliver more of the homes that New Yorkers urgently need,” said Director of City Planning Dan Garodnick.
The move represents a dramatic overhaul for one of the most iconic and hotly contested neighborhoods in Manhattan.
Most of the area was restricted to manufacturing uses in the 1980s under Mayor Ed Koch in an effort to protect the city’s garment factories, which employed 95,000 people at the time. But today there are only 6,600 such jobs in the city, according to the state labor department.
The administration of former Mayor Bill de Blasio was able to rezone the Garment Center to allow more commercial uses, although it still prohibited residential buildings. That has failed to revive the area, and the Adams administration is trying to end the restriction in line with its effort to build more housing.
‘Ripe With Opportunity’
The latest proposal comes at a crucial time for Adams as Garodnick and Maria Springer-Torres, the new first deputy mayor, seek the 26 City Council votes they will need to pass their far-reaching City of Yes proposal without major changes.
City of Yes seeks to spur more than 100,000 new housing units over 15 years by forcing every neighborhood to accept more housing. Crucial in reaching that goal — and encountering strong opposition — are provisions that would end requirements to create parking spaces and allow basement apartments and other so-called accessory dwelling units.
In choosing Midtown South, the administration has chosen an area represented by politicians identified with the YIMBY — yes in my backyard — pro-housing movement: Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine and Council members Powers and Bottcher.
“Midtown South is ripe with opportunity for housing,” said Powers. “In a post-pandemic world, it’s a perfect time to allow for office conversions to housing. The prospect of injecting Midtown with nearly 10,000 new homes is exciting and I look forward to the Midtown South Mixed Use Plan moving forward.”
Bottcher and Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso have been trying to mobilize other political figures to support efforts to build more housing. Bottcher described himself to THE CITY last year as an all-of-the-above supporter of housing supply ideas.
Levine spent much of the year trying to mobilize support to lift the 12 FAR cap — a proposal that Albany lawmakers had refused to act on for years but finally agreed to given the city’s increasingly severe housing crisis.
“The state gave us this power, and we are in the midst of a housing crisis, and it’s appropriate to have buildings of this scale in dense Midtown areas,” said Levine.
Midtown South is the type of neighborhood that can command the high market rents needed to subsidize the mandatory inclusionary affordable requirements, said Basha Gerhards, senior vice president of the Real Estate Board of New York.
She cautions, however, that large projects over 100 units will have to offer the most affordable apartments while paying the highest construction wages under the new 485X tax break for residential buildings — which developers will have to assess before being able to finance projects.
City Planning hopes to certify the Midtown South zoning for the seven-month land use review process around the end of this year. Levine noted community concerns the added density will lead to tear downs and allowed that the city proposal could yet change, but he remains strongly supportive of the plan.
Earlier this year, Adams won a rezoning to increase housing around the four new Metro-North stations being built in The Bronx. The administration is also moving along on neighborhood rezonings for the Queens neighborhoods of Long Island City and Jamaica.
The Midtown South changes could be transformative.
“In the West 30s we are experiencing public safety challenges and businesses are fleeing, and converting the area into a vibrant 24/7 residential and commercial area wouldn’t just help solve the housing crisis,” Levine said.
