October 23, 2007
Latest Details on Moynihan/Penn Station Project
The state released the draft scope for the Moynihan Station project today, and while the details have yet to be finalized, The New York Sun outlines the document's major components. Madison Square Garden will be moved into the rear of the Farley Post Office Building, which will be renamed Moynihan Station. A remade Penn Station will be renamed Moynihan East and will feature a sky-lit train hall surrounded by a million square feet of retail space.
Two new towers will flank the 57-story 1 Penn Plaza Building just north of the current Madison Square Garden. The one to the west will consist of two million square feet of floorspace and the one to the east will be one million square feet. Several blocks around Madison Square Garden will be rezoned from manufacturing to residential and commercial designations, allowing office or residential towers to be built around the new transit hub. Also 4.3 million square feet of development rights from the site of the existing MSG will be transferred to properties in the surrounding area.
Coinciding with the development of the Hudson Yards farther to the west, it sounds like the west side of Manhattan should be dramatically different a decade from now if all goes according to plan. Moynihan Station has been a plan 15 years in the making, however, and not that much progress has been made. Perhaps the release of this latest report will be a turning point for the project. The Municipal Arts Society is following the developments closely.
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as someone who was too young to remember the original grand Penn Station, i say awesome!
They should ban MSG. They are the reason we lost the first Penn Station.
The re-zoning is going to be the final nail in the coffin of manufacturing in Manhattan. Which is quite sad, since the garment district north of MSG is one of my favorite areas in the city. Nowhere else can you still see men and women actually working, using their bodies and their hands for their labor. And it's not just that I enjoy the grit of this neighborhood aesthetically, sans the manufacturing zoning many un-skilled people will lose work opportunities.
This is whole plan reaks of shady back-room deals (like most RE development in this city) and the beneficiaries of this are going to be the developers and the yuppies who move in, not the new yorkers who are currently living and working here. This is a vibrant neighborhood that is still emblematic of the spirit of New York. The high and the low rub shoulders closer here than anywhere else in the city. That's something to celebrate, not re-zone out of existence.
The Farley Post Office is not being renamed, it is a state and National Landmark dedicated as a monument to the political career of Postmaster General James A. Farley. Penn Station is being renamed Moynihan Station. Moynihan West is being constructed in the Historic Farley Post Office along with MSG in the Annex, combined also known as the Farley Building or Farley Complex. Moynihan East is being constructed on the current site of Penn Station. The Historic Farley Post Office is not being renamed and Daniel Patrick Moynihan already has a Federal Courthouse in lower Manhatten dedicated as a monument to his political career. If the Landmark is being renamed I have yet to see the Federal legislation renaming the National Landmark,(because there is no legislation) and any removal of Mr. Farley's name on the Landmark without federal approval violates the Secretary of the Interiors guidelines for Landmark rehabilitation which calls for clear seperations between Historic components and new construction. The guidleines require clear definitions for the public in regards to the "Historic" Post Office which is dedicated to Farley, and the "New" Station which has been dedicated to Moynihan. Anything else is propaganda. The removal of Mr. Farley's name from the Landmark would be a Cultural Policy failure in the application of the urban revitalization process, and would cause the project to loose its Historic Tax ccredits a key component of the deal.
If MSG wants a new arena, they should find some land, buy it and build there instead of taking a public handout. We need to end this sort of bad policy of giving public support to companies that want to build things of dubious value like arenas. If they want one, build one and pay for it.
Pie...sky.
Sky..meet pie.
www.forgotten-ny.com
The Rangers (and Knicks...I don't care about the NBA)
need a new Arena. I can't believe Newark beat them to the punch.
As long as its privately built, that's ok with me.