Friends Of The Upper East Side Historic Districts: Support Reasonable Alternatives To The Blood Center's Commercial Tower

Press release from Friends of the Upper East Side Historic Districts:

October 15, 2021

What does the New York Blood Center want?
The Blood Center wants to demolish its modest 1930s building at 310 East 67th Street, radically upzone the site for intense commercial development, and construct a bulky through-block 334' tower on a residential block where height is currently limited to 75'. The Blood Center itself would own and occupy only the lower 1/3 of the building, while over 60% would be owned by Boston-based developer Longfellow, which plans to lease space to commercial life science tenants.

In terms of height, bulk, use, and location, the proposal in entirely unprecedented. The size of its footprint rivals tower floors of the Empire State Building. It will loom over low-rise neighbors including a branch of the New York Public Library, the Julia Richman Educational Complex containing six schools and serving a citywide population, and St. Catherine's Park, one of the only open green spaces in the neighborhood. Importantly, dismantling the R8B contextual zoning which has governed midblocks for decades sets a dangerous precedent for low-rise side streets across the entire city.

Are there viable alternatives?
The community supports the important work of the Blood Center. However, the scale and nature of the current proposal are grossly inappropriate in any residential neighborhood. There are several viable and reasonable alternatives which would fulfill many of the Blood Center's goals. Alternatives help achieve the following goals:

• A new facility for the Blood Center with large floor plates and a revenue stream to offset costs;
• Expansion of the City's life science industry;
• Job creation (both construction and permanent jobs) through any construction project that yields additional life science space;
• Preserve the scale of the midblock location while allowing for additional density;
• Respect the Julia Richman Education Complex and minimize or eliminate shadow on St. Catherine's Park across the street.

ON-SITE ALTERNATIVES

"As-of-right" Option: Rather than partnering with Longfellow in exchange for a free building, the Blood Center could  (and would according to the Final Environmental Impact Statement) build its own new facility within existing 75' zoning. This would not require any rezoning. This would yield a building with 10% more space than the Blood Center would occupy in the proposed tower.

"Full coverage" Option:  this model permits the Blood Center to use its entire zoning lot but remains within the 75' height limit. This option could yield 321,974 sf, or about 100,000 sf more space than the Blood Center would occupy in the proposed tower. This space could be used for commercial uses, including life science labs, or community facility purposes, like doctor's offices or more space for the Blood Center itself.

OFF-SITE ALTERNATIVES

The City has identified City-owned sites with more appropriate context half a block away, or on East 74th Street where there is a vacant foundation from a previous life science project.

Three City-owned sites (East Harlem, Kips Bay, Long Island City) identified in a 2018 Request for Expressions of Interest for life sciences development similar to what the Blood Center is proposing. None of these sites are in residential neighborhoods, and all have more appropriate zoning and context. The East Harlem site has been vacant since the 1970s and is well-suited to a life science hub.

Conversions of existing buildings to life science uses is a common development strategy used elsewhere in the city. With a glut of over 100 million sf of vacant commercial space as a result of the pandemic, much of it mere blocks from the Blood Center in East Midtown, constructing a brand new 600,000 sf commercial building is absurd.

This press release was produced by Friends of the Upper East Side Historic Districts. The views expressed here are the author’s own.