Results tagged “vornado”

Back in January, it was reported Major League Baseball's new TV network would be the anchor tenant at a planned 21-story glass skyscraper on 125th Street and Park Avenue. Then last month, the skyscraper was reportedly undergoing some changes, since developer Vornado was having trouble securing financing. Now, it looks like there's more trouble, as the NY Times says the plan has started to "unravel," because Vornado wants MLB to "take additional space and pay $2 million a year more in rent." Now MLB may consider staying in Secaucus, NJ and bypass a move to NYC. City officials and Vornado are trying to salvage the deal--Vornado chairman Steve Roth said, "We’re working hard to put this back on track as an important project for our city and this area."

According to WNBC's Jonathan Dienst, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly wrote a letter to the MTA, MSG, Amtrak, and Vornado Realty expressing his dismay over the lack of Penn Station security. Three years after funding had been secured for the construction of a legitimately effective security barrier to protect Penn Station from a truck bomb attack, Kelly says little has been done to implement any plans.

Brookfield Properties, which had offered a plan to bring back streets - as well as 12 million square feet of development and 15 acres of public space - to the West Side Rail Yards, has declined to continue in the bidding process. The MTA had requested revised Hudson Yards proposals with more financial details by yesterday and the bids received were from Durst and Vornado, Tishman Speyer and Morgan Stanley, Extell, and Related Companies.

Ever since real estate developer Vornado revealed plans for a boxy, glassy skyscraper at 125th Street and Park Avenue last March, people were curious what might companies might lease some of the 640,000 square feet. Now the NY Times reveals Major League Baseball will take a swing at starting its cable network in the building. Wow.

New York City's Conflict of Interest Board ruled that there was no problem in Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff continuing to work with real estate developers on multi-billion dollar real estate projects while a city employee, even though he'll be shortly negotiating with these same developers as a private citizen and President of Bloomberg LP, the Mayor's media corporation. According to the New York Post, the board cited "extraordinary circumstances" and said that Doctoroff's negotiations on behalf of the city with Vornado Realty Trust regarding the development of the Hudson Yards and Moynihan station were allowable. Doctoroff recently announced that he will be leaving his City Hall job for the position of President of Bloomberg LP. That company will be negotiating with Vornado for additional space at the building that houses Bloomberg LP's headquarters on Lexington Ave., since Vornado owns that building. The Conflicts of Interest Board gave its blessing on the condition that Doctoroff have no direct dealings with Vornado for a year after he leaves his position as Deputy Mayor.

Word on the street is that Union Square's mammoth Virgin Megastore is closing up shop sometime between now and February 2009. Billboard reports the space is "being offered by a real estate broker for 2009 availability. According to retail sources, New York-based Winick Realty is shopping the space and has sent out packages highlighting its features."

The MTA has apparently narrowed down the list of contenders to develop the West Side Rail Yards - and may even ask them to team up together. According to Crain's New York, the MTA favors the developers who have already lined up tenants. Which means the front runners are The Related Companies with News Corporation and Goldman Sachs, Durst & Vornado with Conde Nast, and Tishman-Speyer with Morgan Stanley. But front runners may need to be partners as well!

The low-slung Port Authority bus terminal will be getting a heady addition: The Port Authority will announce a deal for a tower to be built at its north end. The NY Times reports that Lawrence Ruben Company and Vornado Realty Trust is buying air rights for $400-500 million, which the Port Authority will then be used to add 18 bus platforms, give the terminal a "major face-lift" and overall refurbishing. Well, finally - commuting to...

While everyone knows that the proposals five development teams have offered up for the MTA's West Side rail yards are likely to change, the NY Times' architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff made it clear that he hopes they do, with a withering review of the five plans. Noting the great opportunity that developers have, Ouroussoff says the designs "are not just a disappointment for their lack of imagination, they are also a grim referendum on...

A storefront at the corner of Vanderbilt Avenue and 43rd Street (across from Grand Central) may be a window into the future of the West Side Rail Yards. The MTA unveiled an exhibition of the five proposals to redevelop the rail yards on the Far West Side of Manhattan, and the public will get a chance to see the models every day (except Thanksgiving) through December 3. And what's more, the MTA wants the...

There's been talk of what will happen to the Hotel Pennsylvania for a while now, and today the NY Observer reports that the skyscraper planned to take over the 401 Seventh Avenue address could be stopped by preservationists. Since the demolition project needs to be met with public approval it might not bode well that the construction "would entail building over the railroad tracks that run beneath the hotel and pose engineering and security challenges." However it seems like a done deal, as the NY Times reported today that "Merrill Lynch has been negotiating with Vornado over the terms of a billion-dollar 65-year lease that would give the company control of the half-block hotel site."

After many attempts by World Trade Center developer Larry Silverstein and state officials to keep brokerage Merrill Lynch downtown, the NY Times reports the firm "appears ready" to move to a new, yet-to-be built skyscraper on Seventh Avenue between 32nd and 33rd Streets.

Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: An armored robbery in Queens, a boat in distress east of the Steeplechase Pier in Brooklyn and a school bus accident in Staten Island. The bids are in for the West Side Yards, and the companies that submitted them are Extell Development Company, Brookfield Properties Developer LLC, The Related Companies, TS West Side Holding, LLC (A Joint Venture of Tishman Speyer and Morgan Stanley), and Hudson Center East LLC...

What do tourists like more than walking slowly in bunches, visiting Ground Zero, buying fake handbags in Chinatown, and wearing socks with sandals? Eating at restaurants they can find at home! The Post is reporting that IHOP (aka the International House of Pancakes) is in talks with Vornado to open a location at 1540 Broadway (btwn 45th and 46th). It would be the 2nd Manhattan location for the chain - the first location opened in 2004 at 135th Street and Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard in Harlem.

Plans for a new Penn Station and Madison Square Garden at the historic Farley Post Office building remain as murky as ever. But a recent poll undertaken by the Municipal Art Society (MAS) suggests that Penn Station commuters overwhelmingly favor the prospect of a grand new train station--but they need more information. If and when the project proceeds, who will keep watch over the three mega-developers (the state-run ESDC, along with private companies Related Group and Vornado Realty Trust) to make sure the new-generation Station and Garden turn out better than the last one?

It's difficult to know quite what to say about the huge transformations on the horizon for the Far West Side. That's partly because major negotiations and plans regarding the future of Madison Square Garden, the Farley Post Office, the Javits Center, the 7-train extension, and rezoning are taking place behind closed doors. Another reason is the uneven pace at which the planning proceeds-- years of plodding speculation followed by the sudden unveiling of a proposal, and merely a few months for public review before the deal is sealed.

Today the NY Times introduces us to the man behind some of the city’s most boring buildings.

Both the Observer and the NY Sun look at the slow development process for the Moynihan Station, a project long discussed but stuck in development hell. We think the Observer's sub-headline says it all: "Silver Stops Projects, And There’s Not Much Putzy Governor Can Do; Gargano in Full Gear; Snarled by Property Shuffle With Vornado and Related." To translate: Assembly Leader Sheldon Silver is delaying the project, and since Governor Pataki is a lame duck, he's pretty much toothless in this fight. Enter Charles Gargano, head of the Empire State Development Corporation, who has been trying to get organizations to lobby Silver to stop his delays.

Apparently Sunday is the Metro sections Bloomberg real estate day. Last week we learned about the townhouse that Mike is buying to house his philanthropic foundation and this week we learn about how 731 Lexington Avenue, aka 151 East 58th, aka 1 Beacon Court, aka the Bloomberg Building got its many names.

"People thought of it as Alexander's, and we had to come up with something brand new, something significantly different," Melvyn H. Blum, executive vice president of Vornado, explained three years ago. "Our team — the owners; marketing, design and advertising consultants — struggled for a year or so and threw out thousands of ideas.

Continue reading "The Name Game"

“If you have the right project,” he said, “sometimes it will take less time than the wrong project, especially if there are powerful economic incentives on all sides. If this is the right project, everyone will rally behind it.”That's so true - we've been wondering if the Moynihan Station plans are just a mirage. For once, we agree with NY State development people and hope the project gets started.

They say that history repeats itself, but this is re-dunk-u-lous. Moynihan Station, the long-planned Penn Station expansion into the Farley Post Office that is intended to make up for the destruction of the late, great, original Penn Station (above) hasn't even been built yet but developers are already vying to build a new Madison Square Garden on top of and around it. And yes, this would be MSG number 5 for those of you keeping count at home.

Today's Times tackles the issue of how exactly one escapes from the top of a Manhattan skyscraper during an emergency. Specifically, the Times looks at an interesting new escape method developed by an Israeli company called Escape Rescue Systems.

On the heels of this past weekend's stomach turning report that, yes, bedbugs are on the rise all over the city, two Swiss businesswomen are suing the Hotel Pennsylvania and Vornado Realty Trust over the bedbug-infested stay they had in September. Their lawyer says that when the women complained to a hotel employee about being bitten by something, the employee immediately said, "Bedbugs!" showing that there was knowledge of the pest at the Penn Station-area hotel. The women were treated at a local hospital and also have "gruesome" photographs to show their wounds on their face, necks, torsos, arms and legs. Since travelers tend to carry bedbugs, this is yet another story in a long line of "the hotel's bedbugs bit me" - we remember a case at the Helmsley Hotel in 2003. Gothamist wonders if we should travel with disposable plastic sheets to sleep in the next time we stay in a hotel.

The NY Times is reporting that the Empire State Development Corporation has selected the developers for the long-gestating Moynihan Station (aka the new Penn Station). Now the question is when will construction actually begin? The new plan, which will put NJ Transit and LIRR trains into the Farley Post Office across the street from the existing Penn Station, also includes possibilities for retail, commercial and residential development for Vornado and Related, the two newly named developers. An interesting point in the article regards the structure of the deal:

The two companies will pay about $300 million for the development rights and an annual payment in lieu of property taxes, which has not been disclosed. The size of the payment was a point of contention between state and city officials. City officials had wanted the amount to be higher than real estate taxes downtown so the development would not compete with the rebuilding effort in Lower Manhattan.

likely development contract, which, would be a good part of the $910 million plan to move NJ Transit and LIRR - and possibly Amtrak - out of the current dingy Penn Station.

Vornado says it "is committed to long-term asset enhancement" at Penn Station. And that seems logical. With the Jets stadium and associated development slated for the nearby Hudson Yards, Vornado has significant vested interests in its current holdings in western Midtown. Trying to keep competitors from gaining a foothold near Penn Station is in Vornado's best interest. And the future returns on Vornado's investment could be enormous. With enhanced transportation connections to New Jersey (through the Access to the Region's Core proposal, transit planners envision the commercial development around the future Moynihan station as a Manhattan hub for increased numbers of New Jersey-based commuters. This of course is a very expensive proposal, so the politics with this are complicated.)

Wal-Mart has decided not to continue plans to be in a Queens shopping mall after a lot of community and political opposition. According to the NY Times, Wal-Mart and Vornado Realty Trust, developers of the Rego Park project that would include other retail space and apartment towers, thought that Wal-Mart's continued presence would jeopardize the entire plan. What Gothamist found interesting is that apparently Vornado was hoping to keep it quiet that Wal-Mart was part of the proposal, in order to keep opposition to a minimum; it just seems so insulting and sneaky to try to hide that the country's biggest retailer might be moving into the neighborhood. Sure, Wal-Mart has low prices and people in the community could benefit from that, but Wal-Mart is a non-union shop and has treated employees badly - no matter what their ads want people to think. Now, if it were a Target, we imagine people would be close to dancing in the street. This comes after BJ's Wholesale Club decided not to build in the Bronx, though they may try again later.