City Halts Upper West Side's Largest Planned Development

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — The City Department of Buildings placed a hold Tuesday on an Upper West Side development planned to be the neighborhood's largest building, a department spokesman told Patch.

The hold was issued after both an internal audit and a public zoning challenge brought up issues in developer SJP Properties' plans for 200 Amsterdam Ave. — a proposed 668-foot tall building with more than 350,000 of square footage — a DOB spokesman said.

All construction on the 200 Amsterdam Ave. site must be stopped, including work on the building's foundation, a DOB spokesman told Patch.

A spokeswoman for SJP Properties sent Patch the following statement.

"The zoning and project design for 200 Amsterdam were carefully studied by numerous experts prior to their submission to the Department of Buildings in order to ensure the design of our building fully complied with the zoning for the site.

The complexity of the zoning does not, in any way, negate the fact that the building as designed is in full compliance with the permissible zoning for the site. Noteworthy is the fact that three other recently constructed buildings on the same block employed the very same zoning in the design of their buildings.

We welcome the DOB's followup review of our building permit application. We're confident that upon the completion of its review, the DOB will confirm that the design of the building is in full compliance with the zoning for the site."

City Councilwoman Helen Rosenthal celebrated the city's decision Tuesday.

"I am greatly encouraged that the Department of Buildings has put the proposal at 200 Amsterdam Ave. on hold," Rosenthal said in a statement.

"From the moment the renderings first popped up in the real estate media over a year ago, I and the City Council Land Use Division have been reviewing the proposal for 200 Amsterdam. I was very pleased to work with the Committee for Environmentally Sound Development and support a strong challenge to the project. I believe the zoning challenge shows clearly that the proposal does not add up in terms of open space. This accounting should have been included from the very start."

The DOB audit discovered three main problems with the developers proposal for 200 Amsterdam Ave. In order for the developers to build as high as they wanted they planned to combine several individual zoning lots and purchased air rights into one big lot. But the DOB audit revealed that developers failed to certify that the smaller lots had been combined correctly, a spokesman told Patch. The developers also failed to prove that they can build as high as desired after the lots are combined, the spokesman said.

The developers must complete the required legal requirements to combine the zoning lots or they will not be allowed to proceed with the project, a DOB spokesman said.

A public zoning challenge launched by the Committee for Environmentally Sound Development also turned up a problem with the 200 Amsterdam Ave. proposals. The challenge claimed that open space promised by the developers would not be accessible to the public. The DOB agreed with the claim, a spokesman said. The DOB however did not agree with a zoning claim that 200 Amsterdam Ave's planned bulkhead and mechanical floors — which will exceed the building's maximum building height — violate the city zoning resolution.

Developers need to submit a plan resolving the issues uncovered in both the DOB's internal audit and the public zoning challenge, which must be approved by the city. The DOB spokesman could not speculate as to how the issues will force developers to change their plans for the building site.

Rosenthal said Tuesday that the construction hold represents "significant progress" but she will continue to fight against the planned development.

"This is not a final victory—it will take time for this audit to be resolved," Rosenthal said in a statement. "I, along with partners like Olive and the Committee for Environmentally Sound Development, will keep up the pressure on the Department of Buildings."

Photo by Google Maps street view