Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Good afternoon, everybody. I'm Dan Garodnik, Chair of the City Planning Commission and Director of the Department of City Planning. Welcome to today's review session of the City Planning Commission. The date is March 17, and a happy St. Patrick's Day to everyone. We are joined today by all members of the Commission, Vice Chair Knuckles, Commissioners Benjamin, Cerullo, Crowell, Dweck, Gold, Goodrich, Kramani, Mann, Maureen, Osorio and Rampershed. Thank you to all of you. Before we get into today's agenda, I'd like to go through some recent news involving the Department of City Planning. First of all, I'm happy to report that the latest U. S.

Census data shows that New York City's population grew in each of the past two years bringing our total to 8,478,000 people. Between July 2023 and July 2024, the city grew by 87,000 with all five boroughs gaining population. Our city remains a destination for people from around the world and these numbers are very encouraging as a boost, especially five years after the start of the COVID-nineteen pandemic. March has been a data heavy month so far for city planning. In addition to the latest census data, DCP updated our housing database through the 2024 showing that around 33,900 new homes were completed last year reflecting the surge of permitting that took place in 2022 prior to the expiration of the 421a tax program.

It's a big milestone as 2024 saw the most units completed in a single year since 1965. But our update also found that only around 15,600 new homes received permits. That's a slight decrease from 2023 and one that found only 10 community districts permitting as much housing as the other 49 combined. But with CDBS for housing opportunity now in effect, we can reverse these trends and build a fairer more affordable city. Moving to today's agenda.

We will begin with a presentation on the Jamaica Neighborhood Plan, a transformational proposal to deliver new homes, jobs and infrastructure investments to this Queens community. Jamaica has long been one of the city's bustling commercial and transit hubs, but outdated zoning and a lack of housing and investment have held it back. Where new housing is allowed, there are a few options for affordability and none for required affordability. This plan will change all that. By updating zoning, we'll unlock over 12,000 new homes including approximately 4,000 permanently income restricted affordable homes across a two thirty block area.

This would be the largest mandatory inclusionary housing zone ever mapped in New York City. Among these 4,000 affordable homes would be 120 new homes both rental and homeownership opportunities built by the Department of Housing Preservation and Development across five city owned sites along Guy R. Brewer Boulevard and Union Hall Street. This plan is the result of a two year public engagement process that include over 40 meetings with New Yorkers. It reflects a thoughtful approach delivering much needed housing while respecting Jamaica's unique character and varied sub areas and corridors.

The Jamaica neighborhood plan is also focused on economic opportunity by generating over 2,000,000 square feet of new commercial and community facility space. The plan is projected to generate more than 7,000 new jobs. This will strengthen Jamaica's role as a thriving live work neighborhood where residents can find opportunity close to home. We also know that infrastructure is key to supporting existing and new residents. The city has made significant investments in Southeast Queens to address long standing infrastructure challenges.

This includes a $2,640,000,000 investment to storm water management and more recently a $300,000,000 commitment through City of Yes to kick start critical sewer upgrades in the study area. We're also enhancing streetscapes and public spaces from improvements by the New York City Department of Transportation along Jamaica Avenue and two new public plazas next to Jamaica Station courtesy of the New York City Economic Development Corporation. These improvements will make the neighborhood much more walkable and welcoming. Jamaica's strength has long been its diversity, resilience and economic vitality, there but is so much more to do to ensure that it remains a vibrant home for families of all income levels. The housing, job opportunities and infrastructure investments in this plan would set Jamaica on the path to an even brighter future, one that unlocks its limitless potential.

One quick note, we're going to certify this one on Thursday. So today, we'll hear the presentation, ask questions, but the Eulerp clock will officially start after our special review session on Thursday afternoon. With that, I'd also like to thank City Council Speaker, Adrian Adams Council Member, Doctor. Natasha Williams Council Member, Jim Gennaro and Borough President, Donovan Richards for their leadership throughout the community planning process as well as the members of our steering committee, our sister agencies and every New Yorker who attended a meeting, filled out our survey or shared their priorities for Jamaica. This plan would not have been possible without you.

Finally, I'd like to shout out everyone at the department who helped get us to this point including Council's Office, Economic Development and Regional Planning, Environmental Assessment and Review Division, Housing, Strategic Planning, Technical Review, Transportation, Urban Design, Zoning, comms, inter gov, community planning and civic engagement and of course the Queensborough office. As you can tell, a lot of different divisions at the Department of City Planning were involved in this one. And if I left anybody out, my apologies. My deepest thanks to the Queen's Director, Lynn Zhang and Deputy Director, Kathy Ko and all star planners leading this project including Jasmine Tipale, Sristi Shakya, Crystal Jane Ecksey, Joseph Giambre, Mia Albert, Tao Chen, Andrew Wasserman, Luisa Cheng, Kiyoshi Yamazaki, Andrew Martini and Joy Chen. So thanks to all of you and we look forward to hearing your presentation in just a few minutes.

Next, we're going to hear about land use actions related to the department sorry, the development of a new 1,500,000 square foot commercial building at 350 Park Avenue in East Midtown Manhattan. The project will take advantage of many of the provisions put into place in our 2017 Greater East Midtown plan, which was crafted to help revitalize this essential commercial sector. I will say, Dan Gorodnik and Edith Tsuchen, particularly excited about seeing those tools being put into place. The application for this building would include a transfer of development rights from the neighboring St. Patrick's Cathedral and St.

Bart's Church and the project itself would include a 12,500 square foot public concourse with plantings tables, chairs and fountains. And notably as we mark the five year anniversary of the outbreak of the pandemic in New York, I will note that this is the first new office building that we have on our agenda at the City Planning Commission since the start of the pandemic. Heading to Ocean Hill in East New York and Brooklyn,

the commission will learn about a city map amendment by the MTA to facilitate its expansion of the Broadway Junction Station complex with new ADA access. The amendment would eliminate

a portion of Callahan Kelly Playground used for transit police building and remap a portion of Sackman Street as Parkland. This is a follow-up to the East New York Neighborhood Plan and the $22,000,000 investment into the renovation of Callahan Kelly Playground. And if you have not seen it, should. It's quite incredible. This action will make sure that the city map matches the newly expanded park and creates the space necessary for the $400,000,000 MTA investment to make all platforms and train lines in Broadway Junction accessible.

With five trains running through this transit hub, the A, C, L, J and Z, This renovation would significantly improve life for commuters with disabilities, riders, with children, in strollers, visitors with luggage and many, many others. We will also move to approve a recommendation letter from this commission on the Bayview Correctional Facility General Project Plan commission by the New York State Empire Development Corporation located at 550 West 20th Street in West Chelsea. The building would be converted into nearly 150 income restricted homes with over half serving as supportive housing for New Yorkers reentering society after incarceration and would include a short term transitional residential community facility for adults with mental illness who need extra support. We will also continue our post hearing review of the two development scenarios for Western Rail Yards and Hudson Yards, the first of which includes a gaming facility hotel and commercial and residential buildings and the second of which would create a mix of commercial and residential development. Okay.

That's a lot. Let's get right to it. Sarah, please take it away.

Good afternoon and welcome to the City Planning Commission review session for Monday, 03/17/2025. The time is 01:09 p. M. And a quorum is present. The first item on our agenda is a presentation for a zoning map and zoning tax amendments, UDAP designation, project approval, disposition of city owned property and a city map amendment in Queens Community Districts 8 And 12. Our presenters are Jasmine Tapale, Tracey Shakia, and presenting for the first time to the Commission are Crystal Jane Ecksey and the Director of the Queen's Office, Lynn Xing.

Great. Welcome.

Thank you. Good afternoon, Chair Grodnick and Commissioners. My name is Lynn Zhang, Director of Queen City Planning. Today, I have the pleasure to introduce the Jamaica Neighborhood Plan. I am joined here by colleagues from the Department of Housing Preservation Development, who'll be on hand to answer any questions you may have at the end, as well as my DCP colleagues, Jasmine Tapali, senior lead for community planning, Crystal Jane Ekshi, senior urban designer, and trustee Shakia, Queensborough planner, who will guide us through the presentation.

They are part of a dedicated team of planners, urban designers, environmental planning, and housing experts who are behind this community driven plan for this two thirty block area of Southeast Queens. The plan's goals and strategies that you're about to hear is a culmination of nearly two years of engagement with community leaders and local stakeholders that included over 40 groups and organizations and the offices of 12 elected officials who represent this part of the borough. The Jamaica Neighborhood Plan is an informed and concerted vision for the future of this neighborhood as it supports more housing that would include affordable income restricted units, allows for more opportunities for jobs across different industries, and identifies improvements to public spaces and the necessary infrastructure investments to help this neighborhood thrive. As proposed, the Jamaica Neighborhood Plan is projected to create over 12,000 new homes, of which approximately 4,000 homes would be income restricted and rent regulated. The plan would also create over 2,000,000 square feet of new commercial and community facility floor area, supporting the space for approximately 7,000 new jobs.

All of this to support an area that has excellent public transit and that is accessible to essential services and employment opportunities. I will now turn this over to our lead planner of the study, Jasmine Tafale, who would walk us through the Jamaica Neighborhood Plan.

Great. Thank you.

Hi. Good afternoon.

Hello.

So we'll start with an overview of the proposed actions and introduce the study area. Then we'll go over the history, key context and existing conditions. We'll share a summary of the engagement efforts that shaped this proposal. And finally, we'll dive into the details of the proposal. The Jamaican Neighborhood Plan through the Jamaican Neighborhood Plan, the city is seeking the following land use actions, a zoning map amendment and zoning tax amendment to support the area's growth while ensuring it remains affordable for both current and future residents, and by mapping mandatory inclusionary housing, which would be the largest MIH area mapped across the city.

The proposed actions will also include modifying the existing special Downtown Jamaica district to create more opportunity for community facility and public spaces that support the neighborhood's growth. As co applicant to the application, HPD is also seeking an urban development action area project or UDAP and disposition approvals to redevelop and improve underutilized city owned land with 100% income restricted housing. Lastly, EDC and DOT are co applicants for a related city map amendment action, which would facilitate the construction of two pedestrian plazas as part of the Station Plaza project. So the study area is expansive, and it covers approximately 300 blocks in Jamaica in the Southeast Part of Queens. As you can see on the map, the majority of the study area is located within Community District 12, which includes the neighborhoods of Jamaica, St.

Albans, and Hollis, while a smaller portion to the north located within Community District 8 is covering Fresh Meadows, Hillcrest and Briarwood. Additionally, the study area spans three council districts. Council member Doctor. Nantasha Williams of District 27 represents the majority of the study area and has played a significant role and continues to be a key partner in this process. Additionally, portions of the study area are also represented by Speaker Adrian Adams and Councilmember James Gennaro.

So the Jamaican Neighborhood Plan focuses on key specific areas that are centered around Downtown Jamaica, and it's also known as Jamaica Center. So there are several major transit corridors in the area that connect surrounding neighborhoods to the downtown area and provide essential access to transportation, services, jobs, and housing. So next, we'll share a summary of the history of the study area. Jamaica has a long history of the community where families have lived for generations, contributing to the Jamaica we know today. Its background as a shopping center with famous department stores like the former Macy's and the major transit hub with former electric trolleys, elevated train tracks, and additional LIR stations has shaped the growth of the neighborhood.

In the nineteen fifties and nineteen sixties and beyond, Jamaica and surrounding neighborhoods were some of the few places in New York City where black and brown communities could access homeownership. These communities were targets for subprime lending and other exploitative banking practices. And since the late 1900s, the area has faced economic decline. And by the early 2000s, the foreclosure crisis hit Jamaica particularly hard, like in areas in South Jamaica, destroying community wealth and leaving behind vacant homes that continue to create negative impacts for the neighborhood to this day. In response, several planning efforts over the past decade have aimed to strengthen the neighborhood.

The 2,007 Jamaica rezoning provided opportunities for growth along with several initiatives to envision and bring investment to the area. So next, we'll go over the existing conditions of the study area. Our project area spans over 300 blocks with diverse uses, including single family homes, high rise apartments, small retail shops, large department stores, industrial sites, community facilities like schools and faith based organizations, and transit infrastructure. Surrounding the area are primarily low density residential neighborhoods. So, we've divided the study area into smaller subareas just for the purpose of this presentation.

So, we'll give a quick overview and context for each area. So, first, we're going to look at the North Core area, which is anchored by Hillside Avenue. Hillside Avenue is a major wide street lined with single story stores, some medium sized multifamily buildings, schools, and services with the F train and multiple bus lines running along it. The area South Of Hillside are predominantly residential multifamily buildings and single or two family homes with proximity to Rufus King Park and Queen Central Library. Next, we'll look at the downtown core area anchored by Jamaica Avenue, Archer Avenue, and Suston Boulevard.

In some sections of this area, they have newer department stores and high rise apartment buildings near the Jamaica LAR Station, while other sections sections still feature single story shops, low rise buildings with stores on the ground floor, and a single floor of housing above. The area is well connected by the EJZ lines, the LAR, air train to JFK, and numerous bus routes. So here, we're gonna look at the South Court area, which is located south of the LAR tracks and then East of Suffolk Boulevard. This area includes a mix of single and two family homes and industrial businesses that were mainly built pre 1961 zoning. The area does allow for light manufacturing uses and does not allow housing as of right.

Next, we'll look at the southern corridors anchored by Geyer Brewer, Merrick Boulevard, and parts of Sufton Boulevard and Liberty Avenue. The southern corridors consist mainly of low rise buildings, including single story shops, single and two family homes, and one to three story buildings with ground floor retail and housing above. While they lack direct access to subway and rail lines, several bus lines connect residents to the downtown area. And then lastly, we'll talk about the industrial areas, which are anchored by Liberty Avenue. These areas feature a mix of industrial businesses and pre 1961 homes often located directly across from each other.

Liberty Avenue is a wide street with bus access and accommodates trucks serving industrial businesses in the area. So as we saw in the photos, transportation access is a key asset in Jamaica, bringing surrounding residents to the downtown area for work and access to daily necessities. Demand for housing, especially affordable housing, has soared in the neighborhood around Jamaica and the city, putting pressure on the existing housing stock. According to HPD's housing and vacancy survey, only 1.4% of New York City apartments are available for rent, the lowest housing vacancy rates recorded, which is even lower below 1% in Queens. Further, since 2010, housing production in Jamaica has not kept up with population growth.

As a consequence, approximately one third of Jamaica residents are severely rent burdened, meaning they pay more than half of their income in rent, which is higher than the borough, which is at 28%, and the city's average, which is similarly at 28%. However, Jamaica continues to be a place where people work and shop. And like many areas citywide, the area is still in the midst of recovering from the pandemic while adapting to shifting work and shopping trends. As a result, vacancy rates are slightly higher than what they are in Queens, though they remain close to the citywide average. Jamaica is home to one of New York City's 21 industrial business zones featuring a mix of warehouses, auto related businesses such as mechanics, salvage yards and fleet management, as well as wholesale trade and some manufacturing.

The area also includes food businesses and some hotels and self storage. So despite Jamaica's many strengths and assets, today's zoning presents key challenges. There are no requirements for affordable housing, only industrial potential, and restrictive special district rules make it harder for Jamaica to thrive as a place where people can live, work, and play. So, we shared a high level overview of the background and context we're working in. So next, we'll shift to talking about the plan's public engagement.

We kicked off this process in May 2023, so almost two years now. Later in the 2023, we worked with the community to form a vision for the neighborhood plan and developed a set of six goals to achieve that vision. In February 2024, we then released a draft planning framework with proposed zoning changes and initial draft strategies. We spent the rest of 2024 developing the proposal and studied the proposed zoning changes through environmental review. So from the start, council member Williams formed a steering committee that has met monthly to guide our work.

Councilmember Williams also formed an executive committee of local state and federal elected officials who represent Jamaica. The Jamaica Plan also included input from many city agencies to make sure future policy, programs and services are aligned with the Neighborhood Plan. And lastly, we've had the honor of working with many community members throughout this process. So in the last two years, we've hosted 38 community meetings which range from tabling events and parks and libraries to workshops and working groups to virtual meetings and a dedicated website. As mentioned earlier, the Jamaican Neighborhood Plan is guided by a community driven vision.

This vision is Jamaica is prosperous thanks to its affordability and inclusivity, its diversity, and its business and investment opportunities. We developed six overarching goals to achieve that vision. These goals guide our current and future decision making on housing, transportation, the public realm, arts and culture and more. So many community members have shared their experiences and memories with us to help shape this neighborhood plan. So in collaboration with the MIT Center for Constructive Communication and a community cohort, we developed a tool that allows anyone to visualize documented feedback and see how their insights have influenced our decisions throughout this process.

And so now I'm gonna pass it to my colleague, Crystal, who will be presenting virtually.

Thank you, Jasmine. So now we'll be focusing on the proposal. Noting that here in this section throughout, we'll show proposals through a series of three images. First, what development could look like under today's zoning envelopes. Second, what development could look like under the proposed zoning envelopes annotating the difference in the districts, through added color in those diagrams.

And three, an illustrative visual showing what the future could look like. Guided by our neighborhood plan goals, we developed zoning strategies to support the area's future. These include focusing growth near key transit corridors to take pressure off of the surrounding neighborhoods, requiring permanently income restricted housing throughout the study area, activating ground floors along key corridors to strengthen commercial areas, implementing urban designs and streetscape rules to enhance the neighborhood experience, and creating a better balance between industrial areas and nearby housing. Some of those strategies translate into this map, which shares a proposed framework for how and where the neighborhood should grow. Next, we'll go over the zoning changes we're proposing in more detail.

The focus will be in this area identified in the map, the downtown core. Today, Downtown Jamaica Core along Sutpen Boulevard benefits from transit rich access to the Jamaica Long Island Railroad, the EJZ subway stops, and multiple bus lines, and its direct access to local retail and municipal buildings. The proposed zoning districts in the downtown core maps the highest densities supporting mixed use buildings of residential, commercial, and community facility uses. The C 64, C 63, and C 63 a district support high density development that fits within the existing context around the station, allowing flexible uses, affordable housing, growth through MIH, and increased commercial and community facility FARs to create opportunities for new jobs and businesses through large office spaces, retail stores, and entertainment venues. The image here shows us what today's zoning envelopes would allow along Sutton Boulevard, typically around 13 to 18 stories of high rise buildings with a mix of businesses like retail stores, offices, and homes.

However,

just

like other areas of Jamaica, there is no requirement for new development to include income restricted affordable housing. This image shows the proposed zoning, what the proposed zoning would allow under the district envelopes, designed for major commercial centers where there are strong access to transit, housing, jobs, and services. Required ground floor uses along such areas provide opportunity for local shops and businesses to create an active streetscape. This illustrative view show is showcasing how zoning changes could enable new affordable homes within a fifteen minute walk of transit alongside public space improvements like the new Jamaica Station Plaza, enhancing connectivity, open space, and job access for the community. Here is another area of downtown core along Jamaica Avenue, which has many stores ranging from small beauty supply shops and sneaker stores to large department stores like Burlington and Target.

It's also home to city and state official offices and new housing developments. This image shows what today's zoning envelopes in Downtown Jamaica Special District allowing typically around 12 to 23 stories of high rise buildings with a mix of businesses like retail stores, department stores, offices, and homes. However, just like the rest of downtown area, there is no requirement for income restricted affordable housing within these developments. This image depicts the proposed zoning envelopes, which is very slightly distinguishable. Like we mentioned around Sutton, the proposed zoning districts are designed for major commercial centers with the required ground floor uses to further support local and regional businesses and create an active streetscape between Sutton and Jamaica Avenue.

This illustrative view envisions a future where Jamaica Avenue is prosperous with thriving local businesses and activity throughout the day. We'll now move towards the proposal for the north core of the neighborhood. Just north of Jamaica Avenue is Hillside Avenue, a major street at a 100 foot wide with four lanes of traffic running east and west and parking on both sides with the f subway line running below. Along this corridor within the north core is a mix of residential homes, businesses, schools, and faith based organizations. The proposal looks to map contextual zoning supporting affordable housing while allowing community based uses and businesses to grow, maintaining access to Rufus King Park, local businesses, and essential services.

These districts offer flexibility within a predominantly residential area along this major corridor. Surrounding Rufus King Park, the proposed r seven x creates a contextual quality housing bulk with higher floor ratios for residential and community facility uses. Mapping C four four D within the core and along Hillside Avenue with an equivalent bulk regulation of R eight a maps a contextual quality housing bulk that encourages mixed use buildings, such as those with shops on the Ground Floor and housing above or allowing the flexibility for expanding community uses like a neighborhood center on the 1st Floor with offices above. Today, those zoning rules translate along Hillside Avenue, allowing to allowing for medium sized buildings around six to eight stories and can have a mix of commercial, community facility uses, and housing. However, again, today's zoning does not require any affordable housing to be built.

As seen here, the proposed zoning district envelopes will create better opportunities to make it feasible to create buildings up to 14 stories for more space that supports neighborhood needs. This illustrative image highlights the opportunity for zoning changes to bring permanently income restricted housing, storefronts, and community spaces along with potential investments to this area to create a safer and more welcoming community. Now we'll move south to focus on the southern core corridors. Corridors like Merrick Boulevard depicted here, Gayar Brewer Boulevard, and parts of Siphon Boulevard are major north and south thoroughfares in the southern portion of the study area where longtime residents live and commute to school or work. Merrick is one of Jamaica's major streets with a variety of businesses and homes.

In this specific area, there are several auto related shops. But as you move south along the corridor, you'll find small businesses, some faith based organizations, and beautiful public green spaces like like Archie Spigner and Roy Wilkins Park. The zoning proposal maps mid density residential districts with a c two four commercial overlay as an extension to the downtown core. MIH will also be applied here, ensuring ongoing affordable housing availability throughout new developments. All depicted districts show stand alone scenarios of what is allowed under each map district.

The overlay would further allow flexibility for commercial uses to be included within a development while promoting quality housing along these key corridors, bringing residents closer to their essential day to day needs. Additionally, this area has a lot of surface parking. And through this proposal, there would be the potential to unlock housing opportunities. Today, the rules for Merrick Boulevard can create low low rise buildings with stores on the ground floor and housing above. Although some housing can be built there today, as you can slightly see in the distance, it's very minimal, and there is no requirement to include affordable units.

The proposed zoning changes for this area would allow for medium rise buildings slightly different than what is allowed today. That would include a mix of businesses and housing options. They would also create opportunities for important community spaces like schools, libraries, and medical clinics. This illustrative vision for Merrick highlights the opportunities for zoning changes to create a walkable, neighborhood friendly corridor with local shops, community programs, and safer, more convenient connections to the surrounding area. We will now move to the south core of the neighborhood to discuss the paired district proposal.

Archer Avenue and the Long Island Railroad tracks divide the neighborhood within the within the area south of the tracks consisting primarily of a mix of industrial uses and residential homes. The photo on the left shows the bus terminal, an outdoor semi covered bus waiting and transfer area. It is between Jamaica Avenue and the Long Island Railroad tracks. The bus terminal at 150th Street connects many people to other parts of Southeast Queens. The image on the right is along the same street, 150th Street, but just south of the Long Island Railroad tracks.

Looking at the existing conditions of the M District currently mapped, showing new developments in the areas beyond. The proposed zoning updates reflect the area's evolving needs by accommodate accommodating residential and mixed uses while allowing spaces for light manufacturing to support job growth. Paired zoning districts allow for flexibility of uses governed by the market, allowing for a mix of commercial, multistories of office spaces, and even light manufacturing that is nonhazardous and can be paired with residential uses within developments. The zoning today, as shown in these envelope diagrams, would allow light manufacturing buildings of up to four to six stories. The purple use color shown here signifies the potential development that can take place today, noting here that no new residential uses can develop under today's zoning in this area.

The proposed paired district would unlock residential uses as you can see in this diagram. Through the proposal, the ground floors would remain flexible, allowing either commercial, community facility uses, or light manufacturing uses. Creating the opportunity for residential uses to be developed in the Para District would unlock the ability for more affordable housing close to the core of the neighborhood and within a few minutes of various public transit options. Here is another angle on the other side of the South Core, just north of the Long Island Railroad tracks, which shows the Archer Avenue bus terminal in the foreground. Today, as depicted, you can only develop residential developments up to 25 stories, but this would not include any affordable homes.

The proposal within the South Core shows how the paired districts would unlock much much more potential in development to help facilitate those affordable homes and buildings that allow flexibility for commercial activity, community programs, and other job generating uses. The illustrative view here shows us what a future Archer Avenue could look like. More affordable housing unlocks the opportunity to bring residents closer to the places they live and work. Additionally, investments to the public realm would improve lighting, ground floor activation through businesses, retail activity, jobs, and allow residents to feel safer and more comfortable throughout the day along this area. Now we will focus on the industrial areas of the neighborhood.

This part of this part of Liberty Avenue is in Jamaica's industrial business zone, one of 21 across the city. It's home to a mix of industrial businesses, including auto shops, recycling centers, and a trade school, as well as large municipal and commercial commercial operations like the waste transfer station and MTA's Long Island Railroad. But it's also a place where people live, and there are homes right along Liberty Avenue and across from Dunkirk Avenue on 188th Street. We've heard from residents that there are challenges with these current conditions, such as truck traffic, pollution, and limited pedestrian access, but it also presents an opportunity to rethink how the area works for both businesses and residents alike. Jamaica's large IBZ is located within the core of the South of the Long Island Railroad tracks.

The proposal looks at building the capacity of these IBZs to accommodate job growth and facilities that can remain and grow in place in New York City. The proposed districts will allow higher building heights, creating opportunity for flexible floor plates and businesses to expand in Jamaica. Higher commercial FARs for businesses can support office on the Ground floors that can better integrate businesses to have a presence on our sidewalks. Along Liberty Avenue IVZ Next slide, Jocelyn.

It's just lagging.

Along Liberty Avenue, IBZ adjacent to detective Keith Williams Park, as depicted here, the industrial zoning allows for low rise building envelopes. The proposal would create more flexibility within a larger envelope with a maximum base of six stories and a maximum height of eight stories. Low and midrange floor ratios allow for these large industrial sites to have more flexible envelopes, allowing the potential to expand businesses and then import incorporate additional commercial and or community facility uses. This illustrative vision gives us a sense of what improved industries and streetscapes could look like as we aim for creating a safer, more comfortable neighborhood for residents and workers through the growth of Jamaica's jobs and affordable homes. At this time, I will pass it over to my colleague, Tristy, to continue the proposal special district rules.

Thanks, Crystal. Hi, Christy.

Thank you, Crystal. So to further our goal to strengthen Downtown Jamaica and its nearby major corridors, we are proposing to expand the boundaries of special Downtown Jamaica District established in 2007, depicted by the blue shaded area to cover and extend the entire proposed rezoning area. The proposed expansion is depicted by the pink shaded area. We are proposing a series of special rules within the special Downtown Jamaica District to achieve our goals of ensuring a well supported mixed use neighborhood that meets the needs of the community. To help ensure that schools have spaces for students, the modified special Downtown Jamaica District would exempt up to 150,000 square feet of floor area for schools and zoning lots greater than 20,000 square feet.

The modified Special Downtown Jamaica District would also create an authorization for bulk relief of up to an additional 30 feet to better accommodate this use. To achieve a better balance between adjacent industrial and residential uses, to modified Special Downtown Jamaica District would require certain new industrial businesses within M12A and M123A districts to be fully enclosed within 100 feet of residential use. Additionally, paired M1-2A districts and standalone M2-3A districts would not have the existing 10,000 square feet retail limitation. Create opportunities for new green or public spaces in the project area, the modified special district would create a CPC authorization to allow new developments to access more floor area in our nine and our 10 equivalent districts in exchange for open space. To enhance streetscapes and maintain a cohesive commercial character along key commercial streets, the special Downtown Jamaica District would expand Tier B and Tier C street frameworks along corridors where they don't currently exist.

The modified Downtown Special District also includes a series of other modifications, including building articulation, street wall locations and group parking facilities with the goal to encourage better designs of new buildings that support neighborhood's character and encourage walkable retail corridors in the neighborhood. With the purpose of creating more opportunities for affordable housing for residents, we are proposing to map mandatory inclusionary housing throughout the entire project area. Mapping these districts as MIH areas would require a share of new housing to be permanently income restricted under Options one, two or three. This would be the largest geographical area in New York City where MIH is being applied and would help create approximately 4,000 income restricted units in Jamaica. There are also site based proposals with the related actions.

As part of this application, HPD is seeking designation of urban development action areas, project approval of urban development action area projects and disposition of city owned sites. And also DOT and EDC is also seeking a city map change to modify the boundary lines of a previously planned plaza project, Station Plaza. There are two scattered site clusters that have five underutilized city owned sites located along Union Hall Street and Gaia Brewer Boulevard between 108th Avenue and 110th Avenue that are eligible to be urban development action area projects. In the scattered site cluster one, the proposal would produce 34 dwelling units that would include 100% affordable home ownership where the developers would be selected by HPD. In the scattered site cluster two that has four development sites would produce 83 rental units that would be 100% permanently affordable, the developers would be selected by HPD as well.

Preserving affordability through a range of tenant and homeowner protections is a key objective of the Jamaica Neighborhood Plan. Three key initiatives strategies include retaining and stabilizing housing owners homeowners and supporting generational wealth building through investing in the homeowner help desk, financial and legal counseling to address foreclosure prevention, deep SaaS and home repairs, increasing access to Home Fix two point zero, which supports low and no interest home repair loans, educating tenants about their rights and available resources by partnering with local stakeholders to organize trainings and events in wide range of tenant and homeowner issues, preventing harassment and displacement through launch, the Partners in Preservation in Jamaica, which will fund local CBOs to do tenant organizing, canvassing and conduct tenants' rights workshop. The New York City Department of Transportation with support from the New York City Economic Development Corporation is proposing a city map change to modify the boundary lines of a previously planned plaza project Station Plaza. In 2007, the city acquired land near the LIRR Station to create a public plaza of approximately 0.52 acres. Since 2007, the plaza project has changed in scope due to budget constraints and properties that were unable to acquire to build out the Envision Plaza.

The proposed actions are needed to adjust the previously designated public place to match the existing scope of project. These actions would support two new public plazas totaling approximately 0.45 acres to enhance pedestrian access and safety, improve traffic flow, accommodate bus volumes and provide new public open space in Downtown Jamaica. Next, we'll highlight key funded and ongoing investments in Jamaica. The city has made significant investments in Southeast Queens to address long standing infrastructure challenges. This includes a $2,640,000,000 investment to stormwater management and more recently dollars 300,000,000 commitment through City of Yes to kick start critical sewer upgrades in the study area.

The city is also investing $70,000,000 to enhance pedestrian safety and improve the streetscape along Jamaica Avenue. This project focuses around Jamaica Center from Sutphin Boulevard to Merrick Boulevard and includes upgrades such as seating, improved lighting and other enhancements. Finally, we'll share a summary of the environmental analysis and the racial equity report. A draft environmental impact statement was prepared. DCP acting on behalf of the CPC as lead agency issued a notice of completion of a DEIS on Friday, 03/14/2025.

The DEIS does not identify significant adverse impacts in any of the technical areas in gray. Significant adverse impacts are identified for the categories shown here in purple on the right. Mitigation measures are identified in the DEIS and will be further refined for the FEIS. New York City's Displacement Risk Index is comprised of three risk factors that are combined to create an overall risk level. Population vulnerability includes household characteristics that make a household more or less at risk of being forced to move, like poverty level and how much of your income you spend on rent.

Housing conditions include characteristics of the housing itself that contribute to housing stability, for example, rent stabilization, income restrictions and maintenance issues. Market pressure includes neighborhood conditions that can make it harder for a neighborhood for a household to stay in their home like housing price changes. The heart of the study area, closer to Downtown Jamaica, has higher population vulnerability and less secure housing conditions than other New York City neighborhoods, leading to a higher overall displacement risk, as shown in darker red here sorry, darker pink. The periphery of the study area has lower population vulnerability and market pressure, resulting in intermediate or lower displacement risk, highlighted in light of pink here. As per the report, the local area population in Jamaica, Hollis and St.

Albans is identified as approximately 54% black, 18% Hispanic or Latinx, 15% Asian and 2% white. Currently as per the report, the local area's population in Briarwood, Fresh Meadows and Hillcrest is identified as approximately 37% Asian, 27% White, 19% Hispanic and Latin or Latinx and 12% Black. I would like to pass it back to Jasmine.

So, in summary, the city is seeking a zoning map amendment and zoning tax amendment along with the UDAP action and disposition from HPD and a related city map amendment action from DOT and EDC. Jamaica has long been a home to many multigenerational residents and is a community celebrated for its rich and multicultural significance. With Jamaica's many strengths and assets, this neighborhood plan is envisioning a future where Jamaica is prosperous, thanks to its affordability and inclusivity, its diversity and its business and investment opportunities. And that is the end of our presentation.

Great. Thank you so much, Jasmine, and thank you to all of you who presented here and to the team and all the teams that have worked so hard to get us to this moment. So it's an incredible job, an incredible body of work. Thank you. Thank you.

I'm going to mostly defer to my colleagues here on the commission for questions. The extent they have them, I just wanted one clarification point and Jasmine, maybe you, maybe first, Christy, you can maybe very easy question. But on the special district rules, the things for the open space bonus and the exemption for school floor area and ground floor uses, do those apply across all of the sub areas that you described or do they apply only in some of them? Can you just go back and help us understand what that looks like? And maybe not the industrial one, but you tell us where they actually apply and where they do not.

So our special district does cover our entire study area.

So the open space bonus for all study area, the active ground floor uses across the entire study area.

The only thing I would note is that certain pieces of the special district really apply to certain areas. So, our special district area is the entire area, for example, the open space bonus is really specific to the r nines and r tens of the area, and it's noted in the special district tax.

Okay. That's great. That that really know what? Forgive me for my imprecise question. That really is what I that really is what I'm So the open space so which of these specific rules, open space bonus, the floor area for schools, active ground floor uses and things like building articulation, street wall. For which districts does that apply and for which does it not apply?

So open space, really higher density district. So think of our our downtown area, the R Nines, R Tens, both contextual and noncontextual. Things like the school floor exemption, that is actually across the entire study area. So that can be anywhere within our special district. Things like our streetscape, you might be familiar from City of Yes for economic opportunity where they mapped, like, tier a, b, and c.

We have specific areas where where some of we're expanding it. There are existing rules today, but in some places of Jamaica, like along Hillside Avenue, there weren't any rules. So we were kind of expanding some of those areas because as you saw throughout the presentation, Jamaica has very important corridors that serve a lot of functions, including, like, these commercial areas, and we wanna continue to support growing those.

Okay. Thank you very much. Let me see if there are other questions for you. Starting with Commissioner Goodrich.

Hi.

I have a few questions. I'll start with the council member of this district, Nantasha Williams. She has suggested that the area isn't ready for this or I don't know if she's gone so far to say it's not ready. But she said that it's already overwhelmed with crime and has other social service needs. And this was as recent as less than a month ago.

Let me just, for clarity's sake, pull up what she said. Downtown Jamaica has been facing significant changes, including a growing number of emergency shelters that have overwhelmed social service providers, our public spaces, and the police department. With nearly 12,000 new housing units proposed under the Jamaica neighborhood plan, we must ensure that development is paired with the infrastructure and resources necessary. So she proposed a task force, and I just wonder what became of that. Is there anything being done to address the concerns that she's raised?

So we have been very close partners with the council member. We work with her very regularly, and so we have been in discussions with her around, you know, her vision around a task force. You know, she really envisioned something similar to the Gowanus task force, which was really, like, spearheaded and led by that council member at the time. And so I think, similarly, you know, she's thinking about what her priorities and a task force could look like, And, you know, we would be involved in such that, like, we would be one of the agencies that we would be regularly giving updates to the Neighborhood Plan along with several other agencies that she's really looking to partner with. So I think she's still trying to figure out what those details look like, and that should be kind of ongoing as this process continues.

Would it be before we vote on it?

I believe so, but we can try to get more information from the council member on her timeline.

Thank you. And then there have been some residents of this community who have raised concerns. And it's nothing new when it comes to Queens. It's, you know, are concerns about it. It's very residential.

It's low density. And specifically, I know there was a tenant and homeowner like displacement plan. But some of the loudest critics have been homeowners who say that the plan will push them out because it's going to be 10 to 14 story buildings. And one concern is that it'll change the character of the neighborhood. And I guess sort of going into the council member's concern as well that maybe the neighborhood isn't ready. And the second concern is that it will push them out. And I wonder, what's the department's response to those two concerns?

Yeah. So I actually have our partners at HPD who can talk a little bit about how we're kind of balancing some of these concerns.

Yeah. Great.

Hi. I'm Sarita Potkin, Director of Neighborhood Planning at HPD. I think that's a great question. Obviously, we're thinking about the significant change that will be occurring in this neighborhood with this plan, and have been thinking particularly about both tenants and homeowners in Jamaica who are already at risk of displacement, let alone what might change with kind of the plan itself. That was it was mentioned a little bit during the presentation, but do wanna highlight since you brought up homeowners, highlight our homeowner help desk, which is a really critical initiative that provides one on one support for homeowners around foreclosure prevention, deed theft, tax liens, home repairs, really any financial or legal issue that they might be facing.

This was a pilot program. Jamaica was one of three neighborhoods in the city that was part of this pilot. And it's now definitely now it was recently relaunched citywide, and Jamaica is one of the neighborhoods. And we have a local community based organization, Jamaica Neighborhood Housing Services, that is a local service provider partnered with the Center for New York City Neighborhoods that leads this initiative citywide. So, we think that that is going to be kind of really essential.

And then, as far as tenants, we're also excited to share that our key anti displacement program partners in preservation, which also was recently relaunched citywide, but with really kind of key concentrated areas where residents kind of face most risk of displacement. Jamaica has been selected as one of these neighborhoods, actually, as part of the expansion of the program, due to the increased funds through the City of Yes commitments. So, there were additional anti displacement funding there. Jamaica is one of the new programs or one of the new areas. Local community based organizations will be selected later this year to launch that there.

And that's a program that really supports tenant organizing, tenants' rights workshops, canvassing, door to door canvassing for tenants. So, we think that between these two programs, there will be kind of a strong, strengthened presence for both tenant homeowner support. My

last question,

I was looking for this in the package. So forgive me if it's in there, I just haven't gotten to it yet. But I need a and this is always gonna be my question. I need a better sense of, you know, when I've learned from being on this commission when we say affordability. I mean, it could really just be 6 figures for like a one bedroom for one person. So what is, you know, is there any sense of for the breakdown for affordability about what the AMI is looking like, what the breakdowns will be? Will it be mostly low income? Are we talking middle to high

income? So I'm going

to hand it to Suri to talk a little bit of what it could look like. But the thing that I will mention, though, is that right now, the thing that we studied through this process was studying both sorry, all three options. So we have options one and two, which everyone should be familiar with, but also the newly added standalone option for option three, that was through City of Yes, which has actual deeper affordabilities. So let me hand it to Sarit to see if she can give kind of like specific examples of what that could actually look like.

Absolutely. And thank you for that question. So, you know, we expect around 4,000 affordable units to be created through this rezoning. Of those, around 3,900 will be produced through mandatory inclusionary housing. Jasmine just mentioned the MIH options.

You know, MIH really is the best tool to create affordable homes that are permanently income restricted on private sites. We've been looking predominantly at MIH option one just kind of for the purposes of illustrating a conservative assumption here that would assume 25% of units at 60% of the AMI. To give you a sense of what that looks like, that's rents. If we assume between serving households between 40% to 100% of AMI, That's rents that are between $1,100 to $2,700 for a studio or $1,400 to $4,000 for a two bedroom. That being said, option three, the deep affordability option of MIH, which reserves 20% of units at 40% of the AMI, is obviously now available as a standalone option, to the City of Yes for Housing.

I think that's important to point out. 40% of AMI, that actually serves households starting at or that would be serving households that are at an average of or in between an average of around 56,000 So, that means half of the households would be earning less than that. So, I think that gives you a sense of kind of the full range in terms of the mandatory inclusionary housing units on private sites. Happy to answer more questions. And then we also really want to emphasize the public sites, which have been very essential as a way to achieve cheaper affordabilities.

So we have, you know, the sites that were mentioned earlier. On them, we'll have a 117 affordable units on public sites. These are 100% affordable sites. So there will be 83 affordable rentals, 34 home ownership units. The 83 rentals, we expect to we we don't have the details on kind of the specific program because the developer hasn't been selected yet, but that would be serving between, you know, 30% AMI on the low end to 130% on the high end.

I think what's also important to note about the rentals is that 30% of those units will be set aside for formerly homeless households. So that's the rentals, and I'm happy to give you a little bit more of a sense of what that looks like. But, yeah, 30% AMI, that's $42,000 annual income. I think on the homeownership sites, do you want to talk a little bit about that?

Hi, everyone. You might remember me. I'm Annabel from the Queensland Staten Island Planning Unit at HPD. For homeownership, we're again looking at a UDAP, I think we discussed. This is a an assemblage of of sites, and it would create a larger building that could contain co ops for homeownership.

And the homeownership program is called Open Door. And the AMI ranges for those are a little bit on the higher end. They start at 80% AMI and go up to 130% AMI. We do expect that these would be provided sort of on the lower to mid range, 80% to 100% AMI.

And I can and, yeah, just to give a sense of what that means in terms of the incomes and the rents are Yes.

So incomes

would be from 30% or or I mean, sorry, 80% would be 112,000 a year for a family of three to a hundred and eighty two thousand per year.

Yeah. And what that means in terms of, you know, household costs, just to give you a sense in terms of buying a home in New York City, we're actually looking that means that for someone at 80% AMI, they'd be able to buy a home for between 300,000 to $350,000 So just gives you a sense, a little bit of a sense.

My last question. Have one last thank you. I have one last question. Sorry, I'm pausing because sometimes when I sit here, I'm like, wow, I can't I'm on the commission. I can't even afford this stuff.

So just one technical question. We talked about the vacancy rate is lower in Queens than citywide, and that was attached to housing shortage. And I just wonder if perhaps that just for that particular statistic, if that could just be the fact that this Queens in general is more residential and doesn't have as many rent stabilized apartments or like large apartment buildings. It's more so like one, two family homes that people are renting and if that could be why people are paying a little bit higher rent as opposed to there being this housing shortage? And I ask because the housing shortage is actually, you know, being proposed as the reason for more high density.

Yeah. So I because HPD is the owners of that vacancy survey data. Let me pass it back to them.

Yeah. I think that that might be part of it. I think that's an interesting point. I can definitely go back and try and find out, like, the exact details around that. I think another thing to point out that this is also just something that is critical to point out with that vacancy rate is that there's a lower vacancy rate for lower income households.

And so I think anywhere where we also do see more affordable homes, the vacancy rate is lower. And so I think in this case specifically, yes, You know, 1.4 goes down to point 65% when we're looking at New Yorkers who would be looking for households or looking for homes that are, you know, sixteen fifty or below. And so I think that definitely accounts for the lower vacancy rate in boroughs like Brooklyn and The Bronx, where we see kind of more affordable homes at lower rates. And I think in that across the outer boroughs in general, that's part of it.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Commissioner. I'm going go next to Commissioner Cramane. Before I do, I just wanted to note we've had such a great partnership with Councilmember Williams on this. She has been right with us every step of the way. And we really appreciate the partnership we've had and the efforts that we've made on both sides to try to advance this proposal in a very thoughtful way. So I just wanted to say that out loud. Commissioner?

Thank you, Tara. Thank you and congratulations And thanks for the presentation. I have just a question on engagement. And was wondering if the areas that you showed that were darker pink, the higher risk, was their level of what their level of folks who live in those areas, what their level of participation was in engagement relative to other areas?

So, that area that was in darker pink, that's essentially like the majority of our study area. And so, we've in two years have done 38 events, which meant we have essentially been out in the neighborhood almost every single month. The council member really wanted to prioritize in person engagement. So we've been doing events at local libraries, speaking with people there, have doing events in in different, like, culture institutions in the neighborhood. And so they have been, you know, especially the folks in Jamaica, they're very, very, like, civically minded.

They regularly attend our meetings. And so I think the engagement, even though, you know, we could always be doing more, they definitely have been a lot of people who regularly have been essentially, like, working with us on this proposal.

Thank you, Commissioner. Commissioner Gold?

Thank you. Excuse me. Thanks for the presentation. Clearly, a lot of thought has gone into this. And it looks like quite a bit of public outreach. I just wanted to go over and confirm the numbers. So it sounds like we think the number is about 4,000 units of housing that could be created by the plan. And I just wanted to also there were a couple of sets of numbers that were in the deck or the write up on actual units in the neighborhood. I just wanted to confirm, make sure I'm looking at it right. One set looked like it's at 55,000, and another set about 69,000. So just wanted wanted to see would both sound large, I guess. And I may be looking at the wrong numbers, but I just wanted to see what we're looking at. What's that 4,000 over, if you will?

So the 4,000 is actually the number of u the income restricted unit units that we're trying to produce. And so I actually have a probably a good slide right here, maybe back if I can eventually get there. Got it. But the the overall units that we are proposing to create is around 12,000. And so of those 12,000, there's about 4,000 income restricted units.

Perfect. Thank you. And then just sort of following up, obviously, we've heard Commissioner Goodridge was good about bringing in some of the neighborhood opposition perhaps you've heard. Can you give us a little bit of color really both sides beyond sort of the what you naturally hear from both an opposition and from a positivity standpoint, presumably you've had a lot of outreach. Is the feeling I imagine it is, but is the feeling that the community broadly is looking for this, is excited about this and likes it? And, you know, any sort of, you know, color that you can add. You know, as I say, either on on either side.

Yeah. And I think, you know, from all the engagement, the things that we've been able to gauge is that Jamaica is a very special place to many different people. I think, like I mentioned there, we've met so many people who've lived here for you know, recently, I met someone who's lived here for, like, eighty years. And so it's a it's a place where people really wanna just, like, age in place and hadn't raised their families here. And so the things that we often hear is, it's not that they don't wanna see change.

It's just they wanna make sure that they have a place to be able to live and and, you know, grow out through their days. And so some of the things that we often hear is like, oh, we feel like there's been a decline in quality of life. So I think similar to the thing that commissioner Goodrich had mentioned that the council member specifically has been hearing about kind of things around sanitation, things around crime. You know, I think there is also kind of, like, a feeling and a sense of, like, a decline in, like, quality of of the commercial areas and just I think what I often hear is, like, you know, there used to be kind of, like, this this feeling that back in, like, the the twenties and the forties, because again, we've met many people who can remember that time period, they're like, that was kind of like the golden period of Jamaica, where, like, Jamaica Avenue was this, like, incredible place where you you go shopping there, you go get your shoes, you would go, like, to hang out. There was movie theaters there, things for people to always do.

And so we often, like, hear about kind of, like, those times and, like, how people often reminisce of, like, you know, Jamaica Avenue changed so much and it doesn't feel that way anymore. You know, we often hear like, I don't go to Jamaica Avenue to shop. I go to Long Island. I don't feel like safe or wanna go to Jamaica Avenue anymore. And I think, you know, on the flip side though, what we you know, on the other side, what we often hear is that Jamaica is still so accessible. There are as many people who don't own cars and can't go out to Long Island. And so for those people, you know, they're just like, actually, I have no issue with not that they have no issues with the way Jamaica is right now, but, you know, they feel like it's such an accessible place. I can go walk down the street, go get my daily needs. The the bus is right there. The train is right there.

And they really value that because, you know, not being able to have a car or or a certain, you know, other resources, they can get most of their resources within, like, a ten minute walk. So we kind of often hear both that, you know, I think some people are kind of seeing this feeling this decline in, like, quality of life and and maybe a decline of, the economic area. But then other people kind of see the opportunity of, but it's still an accessible place and it's still a place where I can really just have everything within my reach.

Got it. Got it. Makes sense. Fortunately, unfortunately, fairly typical.

Thank you. You, Commissioner.

As far as Commissioner Gold, I just want to clarify the 12,000 is an incremental increase to a number of units. The 4,000 income restricted is based on the total number of units from this plant, which is over 15,000 units.

Over

It's about 15,300 something, if I'm remembering correctly.

So sorry. So when we say the 12,000 is incremental, but the 15,000 versus the 12,000 is what?

So with the rezoning, we are allowing for more for an additional 12,000 units to be built. So existing zoning would allow about over 3,000 units that we we see it. So so that's the difference. And the 4,000 is is based on the 15,000, the total number of units.

Then give me one more number. What's the base number of units that are, you know, sort of there right now if we know? This is say, saw a couple of different numbers, but I don't know if either one would

We'll look into that and get back to you on that.

Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner, Vice Chair Knuckle.

Thank you. The area in the presentation that you indicated that there would be an incentive for a Ground Floor school or a mixed use with the school on the lower portion of the building, is that based on a shortage of seats in that area? What is what is that predicated on?

So I think this is something we've been looking at citywide. So we know that it's it's hard to locate schools in New York City. So in general, I think citywide, there's a lot of interest to see how zoning can support schools and neighborhoods. And so that's part of it. I think the other part of it is that we do have an impact in schools in two of our subdistricts. So this is kind of another way for us to make sure that through zoning, we can have the space needed for schools.

Also, like along Hillside Avenue, I think we have a concentration of of of car related businesses, etcetera, which would be up zoned, I believe in the scheme here and and ultimately dislocation of those buildings in favor of mixed use development. Where do you envision those businesses going? I mean, would the IBZs be a possible location? What would happen there? Because they my recollection is there are quite a bit of car uses along certainly Hillside and I think some other areas.

Yeah. So a lot of those businesses, even today in the past maybe like five years, I know a lot of the auto businesses you're referring to are kind of like the large car dealerships. There are plenty of them. A lot of them are actually already in the process of being redeveloped today. I think more generally, you know, there are and this is kind of part of the proposal about trying to expand commercial uses.

So there is going to be kind of this additional areas where there can be commercial. It could be the IVZ. It could be kind of these now paired districts, but there are gonna be more spaces for them to kind of be able to expand or go throughout the neighborhood.

Yeah. And I was thinking

more along the

Car repair. I mean, I know the dealerships will look out for themselves ultimately, but, you know, the car repair shops where you have a lot of jobs of of moderate income people.

A lot of those car repair shops aren't actually along Hillside Avenue anymore. Or if they were, maybe they were a long time ago. But I think a lot of the car repair shops are now primarily around the industrial business zone, kind of like starting along Merrick going down Liberty Avenue. That's where we're seeing a lot of the concentration now.

Thank you very much, Mr. Vice Chairman. Commissioner Rampershed?

Thank you for the presentation. And also thank you for the history on our briefing package, Page eight. I thought it was a great job of acknowledging a lot of the historic districts. So I grew up in this neighborhood. I've been going there since 1988. So my mom used to take me to May. So I've seen the transition of Jamaica Avenue when you couldn't walk down the street to right now, you can walk, run. You're not I can see the business has declined down there. So hopefully this will boost the backup. But I have a few questions.

Number one, with regards to the industrial area, in terms of number of manufacturing jobs, do we have an idea of how many are currently there now? And do you project it to grow? And the reason I bring that up, for example, along Liberty Avenue, say around 1 70th Street further down, there are a lot of scrap yards, junk yards. Those areas, which are e designated, obviously, I can't see them really building on that. But do you foresee those jobs going away, those those areas?

So our zoning changes aren't prohibiting any manufacturing. In fact, it's actually growing industrial. Right? And so, you know, something about the number of actual manufacturing jobs, We'll have to get back to you about specific manufacturing jobs. I think we looked at kind of, like, that overall area and jobs, but it includes, like, a mix of not only manufacturing, but also a mix of kind of, like, all the industries that are really in in that area because they can include, like, medical facilities and and services.

So we can get back on a number. But I think, you know, for us, really, like, the the vision is to to grow industrial there, but to grow in a way that is going to be, you know, balanced with the residential in that area. I think we've heard so much about trying to rethink how that industrial business zone can be activated, like you said, for, like, jobs and things like that. But also there are homes in the area that we're trying to make sure don't have to shoulder the burden of those industrial businesses.

A couple more questions. Some of the questions I have were already asked by my fellow colleagues. First, next question I have is with regards to say parks. What commitment has parks or parks will be doing? Because once you generate a lot of this new construction, the public space is also very important obviously. And I know you have Rufus King Park. There's another park near 138th Street near Archer, which I don't know if it's been rehabilitated recently or not. But is there any any other areas in which you're looking to create more open space?

Yeah. That that park that you're talking about actually did recently receive investment. But more generally, we are working with parks to think through what investments could be made through the the current existing public spaces or just public spaces in the area. I think the other thing that we're trying to do through zoning is and and something that Chair Grazik mentioned earlier is that we do have an open space bonus as like another tool to help bring open space in the neighborhood.

And my last question is along Guy Brewer Boulevard and parts of Merrick is a lower density zone as previously mentioned, you're going from an R32 to an R7. What was the reaction from the meetings that you had, guess, those specific residents? Can you just talk about that briefly?

Yeah. I think there is concern about especially like the southern corridors because like you mentioned, they are adjacent to lower density districts. You know, one of the things that came out of City of Yes for economic sorry, City of Yes for housing opportunity with a transition rule that does, you know, address that condition of, like, r ones through r fives right next to r six through r, you know, r six and above. So we can get you more information on how that rule looks like because it does talk about kind of, like, minimum base heights and how it could help create that transition.

Okay. And I'm sorry, one last question, very important. Because this is the Downtown Jamaica, DEP plays a critical role here. As you said, they've been improving the infrastructure. Do you know if they're able to or what's the timeline of them to upgrade the streets in terms of I know they have a sewer system they were implementing in certain sections. Where are they at? Will they be able to handle the projected growth of this rezoning?

So with the sewer upgrades, the current investment right now is around $300,000,000 to start upgrading the sewer system, and that's gonna be over ten years. So it's it's definitely a long term project. In the short term, DEP is looking at shorter term solutions. You know, there is really interesting projects across the city that use water reuse systems. I know they have, like, pilot projects working through that, and they're trying to see kind of what that really looks like and what it takes for that to happen in Jamaica.

The other thing, though, is that in the interim, there is a DOB service notice that does have a requirement for developers planning to build in Jamaica that they need to confirm that there is sewer capacity in the area before they can pull permits. So all of that will remain in place.

Okay. I'll hold back my last comments.

Thank you, Commissioner. Let me go now to Commissioner Muddin.

Thank you, Chair. So I want to drill a little bit down into the housing numbers because I'm a little bit confused. So there's 15,000 units that in total are being built will be built in Jamaica, 3,000 of which are existing under existing zoning, 12,000 of which is going are going to be built as a result of this rezoning, 4,000 of which are going be mandatory inclusionary housing. And then Sarif mentioned 3,900. So I'm going to assume that the 117, the 83 REIT rentals and the 34 home ownership are included in the deduction of that 100 number to 3,900. Is that correct?

So I'm going to defer to some of my colleagues to help

with that.

4,000 number is inclusive of both MIH and the public sites. There's no double counting. MIH and the public sites are separate numbers that add up to get to the 4,000 number.

Okay. So how many public sites does the city have in this rezoning?

So in terms of the sites that you saw in the presentation today, we're advancing both we're advancing two projects, two scattered site projects, the neighborhood construction project and the home ownership project. So that's the 117.

Correct.

We're also exploring other sites in the area to see what other opportunities there might be to increase the amount of deeply affordable housing we can provide in the area.

Well, was that's where you're going down the same road I'm So, if we're projecting 4,000 units, but we have x number of sites that belong to the city, and you're projecting 100% home ownership excuse me, affordable, whether rental or home ownership depending on who picks whatever term sheet, then there might be more than 4,000 units being built. Is that correct?

So as of now, we are not we've there are a few other public sites that we've also projected development on Right. As part of the rezoning. So it's not gonna add to the total number, but the percentage of affordable could get higher.

So when when you say you've identified other sites, those other sites are projected to be a 100% affordable or into the mix of MIH?

In terms of how they're counted in the rezoning right now, they're counted as MIH because there's no project or funds have been identified for them yet.

So there is the possibility that even though 40,000 units are being planned, that there may be more affordable housing depending on at the time of development if there are funds available to make a building let's say 100% affordable?

100%

correct. Yes. And then are there any thoughts about homeownership other than these 34 units? What is your mindset about homeownership at the balance of the 3,900 units? Is this something that you're looking to endeavor to do? Are you leaving that to developers to decide? What are your thoughts on that?

Yes. No. Thank you for that question. Obviously, Jamaica is an area that has a higher homeownership rate than the city, than other parts of Queens, and it has a very important kind of stronghold of homeowners of color, and that's something that we've identified and see as important to kind of preserve and expand upon. It's also one of the city's highest priorities right now.

This administration is really prioritizing homeownership overall, and I think there are a few ways that we do that. We do that through trying to, you know, preserve or retain and stabilize existing homeowners, and that's why we talked about the homeowner help desk before, Jamaica's an area that faced high high foreclosure rates after the two thousand eight crisis, and, you know, that particularly hit homeowners of color who are most at risk of displacement. And so that's been a high priority for us, continues to be a high priority for us. We're also looking at opportunities to kind of connect more Jamaica residents to homeownership opportunities through things like increasing the or better connecting people to our Home First program for funds to sorry, our Home First program for first time homebuyers. So that's a forgivable loan up to $100,000 And that's something that was also recently increased through the City of Yes Commitments, and we're expecting to reach four fifty homeowners a year across the city and, you know, hope to really connect Jamaica homeowners to that resource.

And then the last piece are kind of opportunities to create new affordable housing. Of course, we've already committed the 34 units through the Open Door program. And, yeah, I do think that there is there could be an opportunity for additional sites. We've yet to identify other sites that, you know, through public or, you know, private owners that come to us through an interest would be interested in affordable homeownership term sheet. But that's definitely something we welcome and we'll continue exploring.

That's a good segue to my next question. What about the zombie homes that or the abandoned homes that NYCHA has in their portfolio that they're looking to, I guess, let on RFPs to renovate for homeownership? How does all this play into that?

Yes. So I guess there are homes in NYCHA's portfolio that they're kind of looking to redevelop for what you just mentioned. I mean, I can get more information about that specifically in Jamaica and how you know, what they're thinking about for those units here in this area. And then in terms of zombie homes, you know, that's also yeah. That's a program that, you know, HPD runs. We, you know, have been kind of doing outreach all around the city in the area's highest hit by these kind of zombie homes or homes that were foreclosed on. And Jamaica is definitely one of the areas where we've been doing the outreach and doing the engagement, I can get you more information on exactly what that looks like here.

That would be great because I've done development in Jamaica while at Habitat. And as you know, it's very difficult when you're getting homes that have squatters in them and the developer is responsible to remove them. So it's the more these houses sit out there empty, the more squatters and the more reasons they have for taking over homes. And homes that you designate or NYCHA designates through HPD sometimes have to go back into wherever they go to because of the fact that there's squatters in there. And so the numbers that you think you're producing are not, and it becomes even more difficult.

So Jamaica does have a high prevalence of the squatter situation on these empty homes and NYCHA homes. So to me, it's critical that we get this thing rolling immediately as fast as we can and get those homes into production.

Noted.

Thank you, Commissioner. We now have Commissioners Osorio, Benjamin and Mann, and then we're going to move on to the next item. Commissioner Osorio.

Thank you, Chair. Thanks so much for the presentation and the material. They were very clear, and thanks so much for addressing the questions of my colleagues. I wanted to ask two questions regarding the initial findings of the DEIS, which I also found extremely useful. Both of them build on questions that have been discussed.

First, in terms of displacement and thanks so much to HPD for addressing the questions and also for the data that has been shared with us, very useful. The question I have is more of a comment really. I understand the all of the different initiatives that are in place to address the potential displacement. But since DEIS does find mean, since there's the finding that there's potentially the potential direct displacement of 90 residents, I think it will be important to try to explicitly address how to make sure that they're not they can stay or they can return. My question about displacement is really about the businesses.

And so building on Commissioner Ramperchat's question. And I agree with you. It sounds like the DIS' response to the potential displacement of even some of the industrial but not manufacturing jobs make sense. We're going to create a lot of commercial space and ostensibly they may be able to return. Although not an adverse a significant adverse impact, we're talking about we're about over 1,800 workers.

That's not a small number. And I feel that we need an explicit clear strategy to make sure that they can stay. Now to Commissioner Rampershot's question, the DEIS states that there's 20 firms and three fourteen employees within the IBC. Now these are manufacturing employers that will will likely be displaced. In other words, it's hard to find a immediate kinda like an immediate answer to how the commercial space or the proposed space will actually relocate them.

So my suggestion is that we please find strategic mitigation strategies for that. The second and last question has to do with the open space. And again, I appreciate your response. I think that the bonus is interesting. This is it's really significant that we're finding ways to incentivize the creation of the open space.

But I'm concerned that the DEIS is already signaling that this may be unavoidable significant adverse impact and it may actually just be that. And I think that it's too soon to default to that. And I really encourage you to think about how can the city actually produce that open space to make sure that the affordable housing units that we're proposing are actually safe and can enjoy sort of like from comprehensive planning including access to open space to meet the the standards, the city standards. Thank you.

Yeah. Thank you. And I think the the thing that we are trying to balance to this neighborhood plan is not only zoning changes, but thinking investments to go along with those zoning changes because we know that zoning alone can't solve all the problems in in any neighborhood. And so I think as we're thinking about some of the ways that, you know, zoning can help support, you know, part of the solution, we are thinking about further investments. So we have been working really closely with, like, the Department of Parks. We've been working really closely with, like, small business services to really think about, you know, some of the things that you laid out. And so those conversations are still continuing. And so through this process, we definitely hope to bring back kind of more concrete strategies.

Thank you, Commissioner. Commissioner Benjamin?

Hi. Thank you very much for putting this plan together. Like Commissioner Rampachad, I grew up in Jamaica, and my family still lives there. And the historic situation and the partner report was interesting, but I don't think it went far enough. Historically, Hillside Avenue was a dividing line between black people and white people.

And the white community lived North Of Hillside and the black community was not only South Of Hillside, but they were South of Liberty and Archer. And that was a huge dividing line. That was also reinforced by the transportation systems because Jamaica is the hub. Buses go to Jamaica and out from Jamaica. They don't traverse north and south.

You have to change buses or go to the end of the line at Parsons Avenue and then get the Q25 to go north. So I think that's an important part of the history. And as a result, in terms of the zoning, I'm wondering why you put North Of Hillside in the same plan as South Of Hillside. I think the problems have been different. I think the development that's there is different. So I'm not sure why they're together.

Yeah. You know, I think when it comes to history, this neighborhood has definitely given us many history lessons about this area. I don't think we can spend a whole essay talking about the history of this area. It's it's very significant. And I know the thing we often hear is that people wanna make sure that, one, that history isn't lost, and two, that people actually know it exists.

So that's definitely been one of our one of our goals through this neighborhood plan is to really celebrate the history of Jamaica here. But I think separate from that, just thinking about, like, the areas, you know, we we did look at a really expansive area, and you're absolutely right. Hillside Avenue going to the north is no comparison to the areas south of the IR tracks. They're very different areas. And so we similarly, you know, looked at these areas in very different contexts.

You know, we didn't treat those southern areas similar to, like, the Eastern areas where you have a lot of the industrial areas because they have their own unique set of conditions and issues in the same way that it's very unique from, like, the downtown area or even, like, you know, the West Of Liberty Avenue is very different than the East Of Liberty Avenue. And so you're absolutely right. These areas are very unique and individual to each other. They still coexist together, though. And that's kind of, like, the the kind of threat that we've been looking at it that, like, all these neighborhoods are kind of going into the downtown area for, like, necessities of, like like you mentioned.

If you're going to the bus off of Merrick Boulevard, it'll stop in the downtown area where many people, you know, get off to go take the train, take the bus to work, and things like that. And so trying to figure out the connections.

Yeah. If you're going you're taking the bus on Merrick, you're going to 169th Street or 179th Street, and you're probably not stopping downtown. I mean, that became a big issue in the sixties and seventies, which I actually remember, with the creation of Green Acres and Five Towns. Queens has a higher homeownership as well as a higher car ownership. And so as those malls developed, it was much more convenient to drive out there or to take if you're in South Jamaica, you can take the bus to Valley Stream than it was to go to Downtown Jamaica.

And as downtown as the department stores left, there was Gertz, there was May's, and there was Macy's. Although Macy's was on a Hundred And 65th Street in the middle of nowhere. I mean, there wasn't a bus that went to Macy's. So I would still ask, I know this plan is ambitious, but it's not clear to me why the northern part and how since that part is not represented by council member Williams, but rather by council member Janeiro, how he feels about this plan

and his part of it. Yeah. So council member Williams does actually have part of Hillside, so sections of it. I think she has more like Hillside, the South Side Of Hillside, and De Niro has the northern side going up into the small section of Queens Boulevard we have up there. Yes.

And so, you know, for him, especially that Queens Boulevard area, he really sees as, like, the continuation of of Queens Boulevard trying to continue to build up Queens Boulevard, especially in that section just because it's there's so much opportunity to have, like, that strong, like, streetscape there. So I think for him, he's excited for that aspect of, like, the potential for Queens Boulevard really coming and completing that full section of Queens Boulevard?

I I would just suggest it may have been for me, it may have been easier to have a section for Queens Boulevard and to continue the planning along with the planning principles that are inherent in Queens Boulevard continuing south than to try and incorporate it into the Jamaica plan. Leaving aside why the plan has the areas that it does, I would also ask about the open space bonus. I mean, seems as if there's not necessarily cohesion between the open space bonus and the continuation of commercial continuity on main avenues. How do you see that bonus interacting with the desire to have commercial continuity?

You know, I think there's the there's two things there. One, that open space bonus is optional. So if someone were to choose to to build the open space, they can. And I think the other thing is that we've been hearing, especially from a lot of community members and and especially during scoping, there were a lot of desire to have an open space bonus. I think the the weight of wanting more open space outweighed the kind of continuous commercial area. But I think our zoning rules really are gonna create that strong commercial characteristic, but I think the open space is definitely very important to many people.

Okay. And lastly, when Jamaica was at a tight, I know it was a great place to be. The railroad, the j train and the q train went down Jamaica Avenue, which meant that people were getting out on Jamaica Avenue and going to those shops. By the late sixties, that was no longer the case. And in the seventies and eighties, they actually took down the rails.

And so that continued the commercial degradation of the Jamaica commercial sector because there were no longer people getting off and on there. If you are going to South Jamaica and you're taking what used to be the New York Boulevard buses, You're taking them from either Parsons Boulevard or the E train. So no one is going, nobody's at Jamaica. What is the plan to encourage the foot traffic that would be feeding these commercial operations that we're trying to incent when there's nobody getting off and on?

I think the idea, especially took two parts of this. There is what the zoning could help encourage, and then there is also, you know, what's happening on the ground today through other programs, policies and services. And so, you know, the zoning is hoping to encourage, especially in that downtown area along Jamaica Avenue and along other key corridors, this active streetscape by requiring that the ground floors are active, requiring, you know, certain streetscape enhancement for them to have transparency rules and things like that to to, you know, make sure that, like, what's there in Jamaica today is really strengthened for any new businesses that are coming through. And so I think the other side of it though is that, you know, trying to encourage foot traffic in the area. You know, there is a bid in Downtown Jamaica that recently got consolidated.

So they go from about 165th Street all the way down to Suston Boulevard. You know, they've been, you know, very active in our steering committee. They are also, you know, doing a number of, like, place making activities to really trying to activate Jamaica. You know, they've also been in our meetings and kind of hearing a lot of the concerns as well. So they are similarly trying to make Jamaica Avenue not this place where people when they hear it, they're like, oh, I don't wanna go down there.

So I know that they've been similarly trying to think through, like, how do we really, you know, increase foot traffic. And I know right now, they're actually going through a whole, like, website rebranding and and other ways to really encourage people to come through in Jamaica. And I think separate from that, you know, again, we are thinking about investment in this area, especially thinking about, like, the streetscape to make it a walkable, welcoming place so that, again, like, it's not it encourages people to wanna walk down there. And so DOT does have an investment to redo the streetscape in Jamaica Avenue. So they are adding things like benches.

They're adding things like trees. They're adding things like amenities to really try to make it more comfortable. I think that's something that they've heard through their engagement of, like, well, one of the reasons I don't go down there is because of your shopping. It's just not a welcoming place to to be around.

And if you just my last two points, if you put that together with removing the special permit for parking lots under 300 space, it seems to me maybe we need to think about maybe reducing it. But if we're competing in Jamaica with Valley Stream and Five Towns, and even with Queens Boulevard where people can drive, park their car, get out, go to the mall, I think we need to really think about while we may not love parking, if that is how people in Jamaica and Queens are shopping, maybe we need to continue a special permit for that, allow the parking so that we can create an audience to shop in downtown. And even if we reduce the size, I think even Macy's and the elders had a parking lot. It was on top, but it was a parking lot.

Thank you, Commissioner.

Okay. Thank you. And I'd love to I know we're going to go on a tour, and I'm looking forward to having these more of these discussions.

I think you should take us on a tour.

I could. Thank you very much, Commissioner. Okay. Let me have Commissioner Amman to have the last word of our first word here.

I'll this quick.

Just a couple of questions about the zoning boundaries. I noticed that York College wasn't included, and that's all R6, and there's a bunch of surface parking lots, that's a publicly owned site. So I was just curious why York College is left out.

So two things about York College. We are proposing zoning changes to a very small section of York College. So let me see if I can just go there very quickly. But most of

it is

left out.

But you're right. Most of it is left out. And so throughout this process, we did engage very closely with your college. They are actually about to go through a master planning campus process. So they do have funds from CUNY to think about, like, their entire, you know, their entire campus, which is very large.

Like you mentioned, there's a lot of subsurface parking lots. They have a lot of, like, underutilized green spaces. And so because they're going they're just starting a master planning campus process, you know, we wanna make sure that we're planning with them. And so we decided with them not to propose zoning changes until we can really work with them to think about their needs and think about the future of the campus. But the small section, though, as maybe you can think about it almost like as a phase one.

There is space on one of their in their campus where they do wanna envision, like, a mixed use development. So that as kind of, like, part one of, like, you know, their overall campus plan, we are supporting a higher density there for them to think about a mixed use development in the future.

Got it. Yeah. Okay. It's too bad the timing didn't work out there better. Because it seems like even just giving them more flexibility the C44 rather than the R6 Absolutely.

More sense as part of this proposal. But okay. And then on the MTA question, because, I mean, you know, the the reason, obviously, this was resolved in 2007 was because of the kind of centrality of the Jamaica transit node. There's some EIS impacts, which I'm sure we'll hear more about as we get closer to the public hearing on the escalator access to the but I was just curious if there had been any exploration of decking over or bridging kind of the MTA rail cut here? Because it seems like if one were doing a sort of TOD strategy here, you'd think pretty hard about the MTA rail cut and the ways in which it's kind of a barrier across the community.

I guess it's mostly above grade, creating sort of not great streetscape, below grade and also just kind of being so I was just curious if there have been any conversations with the MTA about thinking about decking over, bridging over, allowing development to occur on top of?

I think that's something that we'll have to talk more with MTA about. I know that their LAR structure is sensitive. I know that they tend to not want to have development within a certain number of feet from from their their rail because of the sensitivities around that area, but we can find out more from them if there's kind of any other challenges to doing that. Okay. Great.

Yeah. And I think just understanding also what what streetscape improvements they would see as valuable for their customers. And then just just on the DEP sewer, because I do think this is obviously, as Commissioner Rampshad mentioned a pretty critical issue and as you noted in the presentation. So maybe when we come back for the pre hearings, just a little more detail on what the DEP sewer commitment is because it's a little bit hard to know what the $300,000,000 represents. That money can disappear pretty quickly below grade. So just curious if we can get into a little more detail on the DEP work.

Sure. We'll bring more detail next time. Thank you.

Great. Thank you very much, Commissioner. Thank you, Jasmine and team. Great stuff. We're going to officially certify this on Thursday. So thank you all for all the good questions. And again, thanks to the team for all of the hard work. Sarah, let's move on to the next item.

The second item on our agenda is a Certification of Special Permits in Menahan Community District 5. Our presenter is Allie Sung.

Hi, Allie.

Hello.

Commissioner Surulo is recused on this one.

All right. Good afternoon, Commissioners.

Good afternoon. Should I go ahead and Yes. Get the Okay. This is a

private application by VNO three fifty Park LLC to facilitate a new commercial office development at 350 Park Avenue in the Midtown East neighborhood of Manhattan Community District 5. The applicant is requesting several actions, certifications to reconstruct noncompliant pre-nineteen sixty one floor area on the development site, two certifications for the transfer of development rights from landmarks, a special permit for a public concourse bonus, and a special permit to modify qualifying site provisions in East Midtown. This slide provides an aerial view of the surrounding area with north at the top of the slide. The development site highlighted here in yellow is located at 350 Park Avenue, bounded by East 52nd Street to the North, Park Avenue to the East, East 51st Street to the South, and Madison Avenue to the West. The project area also includes two landmark sites whose development rights are being transferred to the development site through certification, Saint Patrick's Cathedral and Saint Bartholomew's Church.

The built character of the area is comprised primarily of high density commercial buildings of 20 to 50 stories, characteristic of East Midtown, with a few scattered institutional and mixed use buildings. The area is transit rich with a 51st Street station with access to the sixth line located one block east of the development site and the 5th Avenue 53rd Street station with access to the e and m lines located two blocks northwest. There are several buses that run-in the surrounding area as well, and the Grand Central train shed serving the Metro North Railroad is located below Park Avenue from the development site to Grand Central Terminal. This slide shows the land uses in the surrounding area with north at the top of the slide. The proposed development, again, is outlined in yellow.

The surrounding area is defined as the area within 600 feet of the project area. The mid blocks in the surrounding area are Zones C5 2.5 and C6 4.5. The corridors along the avenues are Zones C5 three and C6 six. As you can see, the area is primarily characterized by commercial uses, which are shown in red. The development site is located within the East Midtown Subdistrict of the Special Midtown District.

The subdistrict was established in the 2017 Greater East Midtown rezoning in order to facilitate a new generation of state of the art class A office towers. The map on the left shows the location of the subdistrict within the Special Midtown District with the development site highlighted in yellow. The map on the right shows the various subareas within the special district. The development site is partially located in the Northern subarea and partially in the Park Avenue subarea. Under the East Midtown regulations, sites that meet certain criteria are deemed qualifying sites and are eligible to increase their maximum permitted FAR via a series of certifications.

These mechanisms include the completion of pre identified transit improvements, the district wide transfer of the landmark floor area or for pre-nineteen 60 '1 buildings through the reconstruction of overbuilt floor area. Projects that use the landmark transfer of development rights or the reconstruction of overbuilt floor area are required to make a contribution to the Public Realm Improvement Fund, which funds street and transit projects in the area. Once developments achieve their maximum permitted FAR through these nondiscretionary certification mechanisms, they can increase their floor area by another three FAR via two special permits for the provision of site specific transit improvements or for the provision of a public concourse. The development site is comprised of Lots 212728 And 33 Of Block 1287 and is outlined here in yellow. The applicant plans to merge all of these lots into one zoning lot.

The development site has an area of about 70,000 square feet and is zoned C 53 On The Avenues And C 52 Point five on the mid block. The western half of the block lies within the northern subarea, while the eastern half lies in the Park Avenue subarea. Lot 21 contains a 23 story approximately 250,000 square foot office building built in 1954. This building is located at 477 Madison Avenue and is proposed to remain, while the lots while Lots 2728, And 33 are proposed to be demolished to construct the proposed development. The existing building at Lot 27 is a five storey approximately 15,000 square foot office building built in 1940.

Lot 28 is a 23 storey approximately 308,000 square foot office building and an approximately 4,000 square foot urban plaza built in 1986. Lot 33 contains a three 30 story, approximately 470,000 square foot office building built in 1961. As you can see on the chart, on the right, the maximum FARs for qualifying sites are different in the Northern Subarea and the Park Avenue subarea of the East Midtown subdistrict. The maximum as of right FAR utilizing landmark transfers of development rights is 18 FAR in the Northern Subarea and 25 FAR in the Park Avenue subarea. The maximum total FARs, including the three FAR bonus for a public concourse, is 21 FAR in the Northern Subarea and 28 FAR in the Park Avenue subarea.

The next few slides are some photos of the development site and its surrounding context. The first image on this slide shows the view looking Northwest from Park Avenue and East 51st Street towards the development site. The second photo shows the view looking Southeast from Park Avenue and East 52nd Street towards the development site. These images show the conditions along East 51st Street. Here, the first image shows a view from Madison Avenue and East 51st Street looking towards the development site.

And the second image shows the view looking Southwest along Madison Avenue. These images show the condition along East 52nd Street. And here you can see the two landmark sites in the project area. The image on the left shows a view of St. Patrick's Cathedral looking west from Madison and East 51st.

The image on the right shows a view of Saint Bartholomew's Church looking south from Park Avenue and East 51st Street. The proposed development is proposed to be constructed on Lots 2728 And 33 of the development site with the building at 477 Madison Avenue on Lot 21 proposed to remain. The applicant is proposing a one million four hundred and fifty five thousand one thousand five hundred and eighty six foot tall commercial office development and a 12,500 square foot public concourse. Citadel and Citadel Securities will be anchor tenants. The building is proposed to contain trading spaces, collaborative spaces, office space and tenant amenities in addition to about 17,000 square feet of ground floor retail space.

The rendering on the right is for illustrative purposes only. Here you can see sections of the building. The first is an east west section looking north, then a northwest sec sorry, a north south section looking West, then an East West section looking South. As you can see, the building steps back en masseing from Park Avenue towards the mid block. Here, you can see a ground floor plan of the proposed development.

The building would have its main entrance on Park Avenue with additional entrances into the retail spaces along East 51st Street and East 52nd Street. Building entrances are shown here in pink. A loading entrance providing access to a below grade loading area would be located on East 51st Street, shown here in orange, and a parking entrance to a 48 space below grade park accessory parking facility would be located on East 52nd Street and is highlighted here in blue. The building lobby would be surrounded on three sides by the public concourse, which has a total area of 12,500 square feet and about 31 feet of depth on all of these frontages. The existing building at 477 Madison, again, would remain.

An East Midtown Public concourse is a bonus privately owned public space typology that can be either enclosed or unenclosed. The public concourse proposed here would be an unenclosed but covered public concourse. It's proposed to be open from 7AM to 10PM daily. The concourse would abut the building's lobby, and the building's lobby and the public concourse would share a 40 foot soffit, and the lobby would be glazed entirely in transparent material, creating a visual connection between the two. The Park Avenue frontage of the public concourse is proposed to contain two water features as well as stairs in the middle and ramps on either side leading up to the building's entrance.

The 51st Street and 52nd Street frontages are proposed to contain six fixed planters, each of which would contain 65 square feet of planting, one tree and 36 linear feet of bench seating wrapping around the edge of the planters. These frontages would also include a total of five movable tables and 10 movable chairs. The public concourse would connect to the retail spaces with two retail entrances fronting on the concourse, one for each of the spaces. The applicant also plans to provide distinctive paving throughout the public concourse and along all of the adjacent sidewalk frontages. Here, you can see illustrative renderings of the public concourse from the corner of East 51st Street and Park Avenue showing the proposed water features and connection to the building lobby.

Here, the first image on the slide shows an illustrative rendering of the concourse along East 51st Street looking towards Park Avenue, and the second rendering shows a view along East 52nd Street looking Northwest towards the proposed retail space. In these images, you can see the proposed planters with fixed seating, planting, and trees as well as the movable tables and chairs. The applicant is requesting a number of actions to facilitate the development, which I will go through in detail one by one. As I mentioned in the beginning of this presentation, in East Midtown qualifying sites are eligible to increase their maximum FAR via certifications and special permits. The applicant has proposed to increase the floor area utilizing transfer of landmark floor area and the reconstruction of pre-nineteen 61 floor area through these East Midtown certifications and then has also sought a special permit for the provision of a public concourse.

In addition, they're seeking a special permit to modify some of the provisions related to qualifying sites. The first actions are the zoning certifications pursuant to ZR81643A and B, to certify that about 90,000 square feet of overbuilt pre-nineteen 61 floor area exists on the development site and can be demolished and rebuilt on the site in combination with a contribution of about $5,508,000 to the Public Realm Improvement Fund. The next actions are two zoning certifications for the transfer of development rights from landmarks to the development site. The applicant proposes to transfer 315,000 zoning square feet from Saint Patrick's Cathedral and about 170,000 zoning square feet from Saint Bartholomew's Church. These transfers would be accompanied with a contribution of about 30,342,000 to the Public Realm Improvement Fund.

The applicant is also seeking a special permit for a public concourse bonus of 3 FAR or about 203,000 zoning square feet of floor area for the provision of the 12,500 square foot public concourse. It's proposed to be of generous proportions and quality design. Here you can see renderings of the public concourse once again. And this is the design as proposed by the applicant. The last action is a special permit pursuant to ZR 81,685 to permit modifications to the provisions applicable to the development site, and these modifications are sought to facilitate the proposed development.

They're seeking a modification to waive the type of publicly accessible space specified in the qualifying site definition for East Midtown and are instead providing the previously described public concourse. They are also seeking modifications for bulk flexibility in relation to the East Midtown subarea boundary dividing the development site as well as heightened setback modifications. They are also seeking modifications to streetscape requirements and pedestrian circulation space as well as the location of the main building entrance. All of these modifications facilitate the proposed development's design. This application requires a racial equity report, which helps put the proposal into context with neighborhood level socioeconomic data.

There's no housing proposed as part of this application. The displacement risk index estimates comparative levels of residential displacement risk for New York City's neighborhoods. The index ranks neighborhoods from lowest to highest risk based on recent population characteristics, housing conditions and market pressures. On this index, Chelsea, Clinton And Midtown Business District falls into the lowest displacement risk category. The population of Chelsea, Clinton And Midtown Business District is 54% white non Hispanic, 18% Asian, 16% Hispanic or Latino, and 7% black non Hispanic.

From 2010 to 2020, the area saw a 28% increase in population with an increase in the Asian, black, Hispanic and white populations. While the population grew 28% from 2010 to 2020, the number of housing units in Chelsea Clinton and Midtown Business District grew by 25%. The housing production in this region was greater than Manhattan overall and New York City overall, which showed an increase in housing of 89%, respectively. In summary, the applicant is seeking a number of actions to facilitate a new approximately fifteen eighty six foot tall, 1,455,000 zoning square foot commercial office tower with a 12,500 square foot public concourse in the East Midtown neighborhood of Community District 5. Thank you, and I'm happy to answer any questions.

Great. Thanks, Allie. Just a couple from me. The on the concourse and the design, is there a clear visual connection between 51 And 52 through the transparent area of the lobby or just through the open space, the unenclosed, covered open space from 51st To 52nd Street?

I'm not sure if I can definitively answer that question. I think the applicant will be able to. But I do know that the entire lobby is being glazed in transparent materials. So I guess maybe depending on the time of day, you might be able to see fully through or exactly how that material functions. But I don't wanna say definitively, but that lobby will be transparently glazed.

So Okay. That's I think it's

sorry. Fair to say that the intention is for it to be fully transparent? One of these things that when you actually see the materials in practice, I think the applicant and their team can provide a little bit more specificity, but the intention is to have the openness of the VISTA.

Okay. Great. And the water feature water features were a little difficult to see on the slide. Maybe you can pull back. You had mentioned it on slide 17. It may also be on slide 24.

If you can kind of see them here, these fountains that are right at the entrance. But they're also shown on this plan, but obviously not in design detail. But the renderings, regardless, are illustrative only. So these are

the look Can you describe in words where you see Oh, sure. They're here in on this.

In blue on the In the blue.

Oh, actually, it was sort of the key. This one has the key. Okay. Got it. Now go back to go back to the last one for a second.

Then do you see the two people walking? Yep. It's sort of behind there, and they're walking up those ramps that were shown on the previous slide.

Okay. On the proposed closure, how does the applicant propose to close this space after 10PM?

We actually don't know. I don't believe there are any proposed material stanchions wise or anything to that effect.

No fence proposed. No gates.

I don't think we would be okay with that. That's for sure. Good. Yeah.

Sorry, go ahead. No. But nothing. There is nothing that's proposed to be a block to keep people physically out even if it were legally able to be closed after ten p. M?

None that we know of, but the applicants can speak further to what they plan for the closure.

Okay. I will just note that it's very satisfying to see not just one, but more than one of the components of the East Midtown rezoning come into play in this building through landmarks transfers, public concourse, the reconstruction of noncompliant floor area. There's a lot of components here, which we had hoped would be used. Glad to see them in effect here. Okay. Let me see if there are other questions. Commissioner Ma'am?

Yeah. Just one quick question. Was there any discussions with the applicant about using the transit mechanism to achieve the full floor area for this building? Just kind of building on the chair's comment about the mechanisms in East Midtown.

So they're outside of the mandatory transit improvement areas. And obviously, there's a discretionary bonus, but they're not quite proximate enough to be able to make a direct improvement. There is train shed that runs under the Park Avenue facing site, but that's you know, it's nothing that would pop up that they could provide an improvement to. So based on that, there is no discussion.

Got it. And and just the other question on on the, on the public realm. I know there's been sort of ongoing discussions about the Park Avenue median improvement. I was just curious where that stood just more broadly.

That's a great question. The, governing group, recently was able to, put out an RFP for landscape architect who's gonna come up with the design vision for the medians. They're happening in kind of a a sequence that makes sense at least to Metro North and their needs and, so it's not necessarily linear. It seems to be that with JPMorgan at 270 Park Avenue, because they were already redeveloping there and, you know, disturbing the ground. They worked very closely with, MTA and well, Metro North and DDC to come up with a median design there.

But we'd like to have a cohesive vision for the whole corridor. And that's also acknowledging that we would probably have to have a good idea of what we'd like to see in each given median area before it gets dug up and then covered over. Because if you need maybe infrastructure to support like a water feature or extra support for, like, art features. We would need to know that kind of infrastructure requirements ahead of time. So that, consultant should be onboarded by midyear. So it's a DOT question, for sure.

Yeah. I just I mean, I'm

just curious because it seems like given the level of construction disruption with these projects, always nice to get some bang for the buck on the public realm side, if that's possible.

I think it will probably be the case. I think that MNR and DOT will probably work to pivot to work with this applicant more quickly about the meetings. Because I think from the applicant's perspective as well, they would like their front door to, you know, also be, in as tidy shape in a, you know, expeditious fashion.

K. Great. Thanks. Thank you, Commissioner. Commissioner Marine? Thank you, Jeff.

So speaking to the public realm, I noticed that you mentioned that there are six fixed planters, which are 64 square feet. They're pretty large. And then you have only two tables and 10 chairs for the entire space?

Five tables and 10 chairs.

Five tables and 10 chairs.

And then that's in addition to in yellow here, you can see that's the bench seating around the planter. Yeah.

Those are those look. Those are those are somewhat uncomfortable where you're trying to have your lunch or you're trying to have a conversation and you're sitting in this direction and you're trying to have to talk in this direction. It's kind of those those benches don't ever get life. I never see them in any public realm where they're being used to the 100%. It's that I would I think it would behoove the applicant to think about that and think about more in my personal opinion, more movable table and chairs gives you the opportunity to create a more a different atmosphere where you can get in groups.

And if want to do a study group or you want to have a lunch, you have more of the opportunity to congregate those, whereas here in these fixed planters, they also create an obstacle in walking and the path and enjoying that open space that's underneath it. That's pretty wide.

We think that's Yes. Very I

see you smiling. I think you agree. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner. Okay. All right. Commissioner Dwight? How many square feet of the project is going to be occupied by Citadel?

Unknown at this point. It's gonna be, like, one of their main headquarters, but that's a good question for the applicant. I know that there are trading floors and, like, certain programmatic needs that Saddell will have to occupy. Any percentage? Any rough percentage of the building? Not off the top of my head. But but we could find out and get back to you even before

see, we have know, how much they're building on spec in this market. Thank you.

Thanks, Commissioner. Thank you, Ali. Thank you, Ezra. This item is now certified.

We'll see

you again soon. Thank you very much. Let's move on.

The third item on our agenda is a certification of a city map amendment in Brooklyn Community District 16. Our presenter is Abraham Abreu.

All right, Abraham.

Good afternoon, everybody.

Good afternoon. Yes.

So this is, Broadway Junction Station City Map Amendment in city, Brooklyn's Community District 16. This is a joint application by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation seeking a city map amendment to accomplish three things, basically. Number one is the elimination of a portion of Callahan Kelly Playground as Parkland. Number two, the elimination discontinuance enclosure of a portion of Sackman Street that is currently, kind of cutting the park in map parking too. And three, the establishment of New Parkland over the two b demap portion of Sacramento Street that this application proposes to demap.

This would facilitate the expansion of the Broadway Junction, station complex and improvements to that complex as well as unification of the two disparate parts of the playground. I'd also like to point out that this project area is in the Northwestern corner of the rezoning area for the, East New York neighborhood plan, which I'll talk about a little bit more in a couple of slides. Please. There we go. So a little bit of background first.

First, talking about the playground itself. So, in 1939, Callahan Kelly Playground, which was then called Callahan Kelly Square, was established between Eastern Parkway to the West, Van Sinderen Avenue to the North, Truxtun Street or Van Sinderen Avenue to the East, excuse me, Truxtun Street to the North, and Fulton Street to the South. And then with, Sackland Street ends up now running through kind of the a third of the way, from the West end. Also important to note, and we'll dive into this a bit more later as well, but, in 1982, the state authorized alienation of about 0.4 acres of Callahan Kelly Park Playground and the transfer of that land to the transit authority to facilitate the construction of a police station, which is still there today, as well as part of the station that's transit station entrance. That's what's outlined in blue on this this slide, and this is, some background for what the mapping action that's being proposed today is.

I'd also like to give some background. I mentioned the East New York neighborhood plan earlier, so a little bit of background on some recent planning efforts that have happened in this area. Excuse me. So first of all, in 2016, East New York neighborhood plan kicked off a series of city and state led investments in infrastructure and services across East New York, including the Broadway Junction area here. And here in Broadway Junction, the parks department undertook approximately $22,000,000 renovation of Callahan Kelly Playground and city DOT, reconstructed Van Sinderen Avenue in front of this important transit hub, adding a double bus lane and sidewalk extensions to improve bus service and build new safer pedestrian space.

Then, EDC undertook a study of Broadway Junction in 2019 that laid out a blueprint for the future of the area. Among other goals bless you. Among other goals, it identified making the Broadway Junction Station fully accessible and making public realm improvements as priorities. Then in 2023, the city and the MTA announced further half billion dollars of major capital investment in and around Broadway Junction Station. This included 400,000,000 for accessibility upgrades to the Broadway Junction Station complex, including a renovated station, seven new elevators and escalator improvements to finally bring full ADA access to this important station hub, and 95,000,000 in capital funding for public realm improvements, which include a new eastern entry plaza for Callahan Kelly Playground and the subway station.

So now let's get some geographic context. So here is the land use context map showing the project area in red and the park demapping in, like, green color in the corner. You can see that kind of northwest and south of the project site, the land use is predominantly residential with some commercial. And then kind of northeast and east, you see that purple for industrial uses, including the East New York MTA Depot. Here is an aerial, again, with the project area outlined in red.

You can see there's a great deal of transportation infrastructure at the area, including, of course, Broadway Junction Station, which serves the a, c, j, z, and l trains. Further south on Atlantic Avenue, we have the East New York Long Island Railroad Station, as well as several other subway stations, for the AC, the JZ, and the L as they move in and out of this Broadway Junction area. You can also see very prominently, excuse me, the East New York Depot. And then up in the, sort of the northeast corner of the the image is, the Evergreen Cemetery and the terminus of the Jackie Robinson Expressway. Zooming in a little closer, just wanna point out in the Southeast corner is, the transit bureau district thirty three, facilitated by that 1982 alienation that I mentioned earlier.

Look at some site photos real quick, to kinda get oriented. So this is a view of Broadway Junction, Station Compass looking westward from Van Cinderen Avenue on the eastern end of the project site. This is a view looking, east down Truxtun Street from Eastern Parkway. So this is the northern edge of the playground. This is a view, farther, down Truxtun, looking at excuse me, the Broadway Junction pedestrian skyway.

And then finally, this is looking, along Fulton Street near the intersection of Eastern Parkway. So this is the southern edge of the playground. This is a graphic from the MTA showing the layout of the station complex, which is the third largest in Brooklyn, showing, the location of various improvements including several new elevators, a new entrance to the L off in Citroen Avenue, and a new passageway, from the L to the A and C trains. So specifically, some of the improvements that will be made, all platforms and train lines will be made ADA accessible through ramps and elevators, including all internal transfers between lines. Second entrance would be constructed on the east side of Van Sinderen Avenue.

The existing set house will be expanded within the portion of Cal Callahan Kelly Playground to be demapped to create space for new elevators. And the project will also replace existing escalators and perform some other repairs that are needed. So jumping into the actual actions that are being requested. Again, as mentioned, the MTA and the Parks Department are seeking a city map amendment to, number one, eliminate a portion of Callahan Kelly Playground as Parkland, which is shown in green. Two, eliminate, discontinue, and close a portion of Sacrament Street, which is shown in that heavy dashed line.

And then three, take that DMAP part of Sacrament Street and remap it as Parkland. So I showed that diagram earlier with, the blue outline and kinda here's why. So the Parkland to be demapped in if this application is improved, approved, that's you, basically consists of, two kind of portions or sub areas. So first, in blue is what we talked about earlier, which is the area that was historically alienated in 1982 for the, police facility, but it was never actually taken off. Like, the authorization was given, but it was never actually taken off to see that.

Second, in red, this was authorized to be alienated in 2022 to facilitate, these various ADA improvements to Broadway the Broadway Junction Station that we just talked about a couple of slides ago. The demapping of street and then remapping as Parkland of Sackland Street is intended to offset the loss of Parkland by created by the red area. So when you put those two, the red and blue together, you get the green, which is what the totality of will be taken off the city map if this application is approved. Yes. So to conclude, this is an application by the MT and DPR for a city map amendment to facilitate these changes that we just talked about, and you can see summarized on actions in this slide.

These actions would facilitate the expansion and improvement of Broadway Junction Station Complex and the unification of these two halves of Callahan And Cali Playground that are currently divided by a map street. So that is the project. I'm happy to take any questions. Excellent. Thank you. Questions?

Seeing none, we're certified. Thank you. Thank you. We'll move on to the next. I will call it up. We're doing our pre hearing reviews. Madam Secretary, what is our first pre hearing?

The fourth item on our agenda is a pre hearing review of the zoning map and zoning text amendments in Brooklyn Community District 5. Our presenter is Lindsay Robinson.

Hi there.

Hi. Good afternoon, everyone. Okay. This is a pre a pre hearing follow-up for a private application certified on 12/02/2024. A little bit about the application.

Grace House is a private application by Grace Housing Department Fund requesting a zoning map amendment and a zoning text amendment to designate an MIH area to facilitate a 148,700 square foot seven story development. The proposed development will include 132,800 square feet of residential space with 153 income restricted units, a 15,900 square foot community facility and 68 below grade parking spaces. To orient you a little bit, the project location is located at 233 New Jersey Avenue in East New York in Community District 5, Brooklyn under council member Sandy Nurse for city council district thirty seven. The development will consist of two frontages with five stories fronting New Jersey Avenue and seven stories fronting Vermont Avenue. The New Jersey Avenue frontage will include Grace House Baptist Church as part of the 15,900 square foot community facility space.

The first action required to facilitate the proposed development is a zoning map amendment from a R5B to a R6A zoning district. Sorry about that. The rezoning would permit a maximum 3.9 FAR for residential use with a base height of 65 feet before reaching a maximum height of 95 feet. As the project area is located in an outer transit zone, off street parking is required for 25% of market rate units. No parking is required for income restricted units, and the maximum allowed for a parking waiver is 15 spaces.

The second action needed to facilitate the construction of the proposed development is a zoning tax amendment to establish the project area as an MIH area. The applicant is mapping options one and two. Moving on to the community board and borough present recommendations, I will now summarize their conditions. On 01/30/2025, Community Board five held a public hearing and voted to approve with conditions 14 in favor, nine against and two abstaining. The recommendations are prioritizing CB5 shelter residents and existing tenants for new housing, cap building heights to protect light and air quality, assess infrastructure capacity for new residents, exceed HPD unit size minimums for better living conditions, increase family size units for affordability and homelessness prevention, follow Ella guidelines for long term affordability and limit rezoning to 13 designated lots to prevent overdevelopment.

With these conditions in place, Brooklyn Community Board five approved the Grace Houses project, ensuring it aligns with the needs and well-being of local residents. On February 5, the borough president held a public hearing on February 26 I'm sorry, 2025 and submitted a recommended approval with no modifications or conditions. In summary, Grace House is a private application by Grace Housing Development Fund requesting a zoning map amendment from an R5B to a R6A and a zoning text amendment to designate an MIH area to facilitate a 148,700 square foot seven story residential development with community facility space and 68 below grade parking spaces. This concludes my presentation and happy to take any questions.

Great. Well, we're going to see this for a public hearing on Wednesday. Are there questions now? Okay. We'll pick it up then. Thank you. Let's move to Item five.

The fifth item on our

agenda is a prehearing review of a zoning map and zoning tax amendments and special permit in Brooklyn Community District 3. Our presenter is Demetrius McAllister.

All right. Demetrius, welcome. Thank you.

Good afternoon, Chair Gronick and commissioners.

Good afternoon.

This application this is an application that was certified on December 2024 and is returning for a public hearing on Wednesday, 03/19/2025. This applicant is requesting a zoning map amendment, zoning text amendment for MIH, and a special permit for a large scale general development in order to facilitate a 14 story, 175,017 square foot residential building with 292 dwelling units, all of which would be affordable independent residents for seniors and supported by HPD's senior affordable rental program. As a reminder, the applicant proposed to develop on a parking lot located in the mid block portion of the site occupied by a 267 unit affordable housing complex containing four buildings. The light gray represents the footprint of the existing building, while the dark gray is the new proposed building. In addition to the proposed development, new plantings, landscaping, furniture, and fencing shown in dark green will be employed to improve the overall site plan.

This will coincide with a 7434 square foot square feet of streetscape improvements along the perimeter of development site, which includes new fencing and planting street trees as well as 7,298 square feet of planted area in the preexisting courtyard as well as the creation of a new courtyard shown in orange between the proposed 14 story Ayers Building and the existing building. To facilitate this development, the applicant is seeking a zoning map amendment to re to rezone or excuse me. To rezone the project area from R 6 and R 6 C 24 districts to r seven a and r seven a c two four districts respectively, which would permit an FAR up to 5.01 and a building height up to a 115 feet under the new bulk regulations from city of yes for housing opportunity. The applicant is also seeking a zoning tax amendment to appendix f in order to establish a mandatory inclusionary housing area and a large scale general development special permit to modify height and bulk regulations. Specifically, the applicant is seeking a special permit for a height waiver to increase the maximum building height by 40 feet, which according to the applicant team will result in a better site plan and a better relationship of the proposed building to the surrounding buildings and the street.

The development would have a series of setbacks and articulated facades as well as new open space and 63 parking spaces in the cellar that will replace the surface parking that serves residents of the existing buildings on the site. But the applicant application was certified prior to see a yes to housing opportunities approval, which includes updates to the underlying bulk envelope for the proposed R 7 A District. As a part of CHO, the maximum base height changed from 75 feet to 85 feet and a maximum build height changed from 95 feet to a 115 feet for R 7 A Districts. On 02/03/2025, community board three held a public hearing and voted on a recommendation to approve with conditions. The board voted 18 in favor, not against, and two abstaining.

Some of the conditions include all housing units being designated as permanently affordable, using a local marketing agent to advertise the available units, setting aside allocated open space to seniors within the site plan's open space layout, amongst other requests. On 02/05/2025, the borough president held a public meeting and voted to approve this proposal. In conclusion, the applicant has requested a zoning map amendment, zoning text amendment, and a zoning special permit. These requested actions will facilitate the development of a new residential building containing two ninety two income restricted units of affordable senior housing and at 14 storey for approximately 175,000 square feet of residential space. Additionally, the actions will also contain over 7,000 square feet of streetscape and open space improvements.

This concludes my presentation. Happy to field any final questions you may have.

Great. Thank you.

Okay. We're going to pick this up on Wednesday. Thank you very much. Okay. Let's move on to number six.

The sixth item on our

agenda is a pre hearing review of a city map amendment in Brooklyn Community District 13. Our presenter is Steven Johnson.

Hi, Steven. Hello. Good afternoon, commissioners. Afternoon.

Is an application by TSG Coney Island Entertainment HoldCo LLC for a city map change to to facilitate the development of a gaming facility and associated uses located in Coney Island, Brooklyn Community Board thirteen. This project is to demap portions of streets, purchase volumes of air over streets, and to change the grade of a street. The project was certified on 12/16/2024 and is back for pre hearing review for the EULIP action. And the public hearing is on Wednesday, March 19, which will also serve as a public hearing for the draft environmental impact statement. Written comments for the DEIS are accepted by the Department of City Planning through Monday, March 31.

So the applicant controls a number of smaller lots on four blocks in Coney Island, and they are proposing to build on these lots and then to connect them with two bridges over two city streets. This would facilitate the development of a casino, a hotel, and other related uses that would be part of a gaming application to be submitted to the state this summer. These are the four elements of the proposed land use action, which is to amend the city map. The first is to eliminate, discontinue, and close a portion of Bowery, demap and purchase a volume of air over a portion of West 12th Street, D map and purchase a volume of air over a portion of Stillwell, and change the grade of a portion of Stillwell Avenue. The proposed land use action in conjunction with the recently adopted gaming facility text amendment would allow the state to consider a gaming application by the applicant for a gaming facility license on the development site.

The applicant is seeking one of the three available commercial gaming license that will be awarded by the end of this year. And the applicant has stated if they are not awarded one of these three gaming licenses, they would not pursue this project and the development site would remain as is in its existing condition. Now the gaming facility text amendment was approved on 04/18/2024. This amendment permitted the gaming use for the first time in the city. And the tax amendment does not allow any future casinos or gaming facilities in the city that are not related to this specific state gaming commission process and these three available licenses.

As an approval by the gaming commission via the gaming facility location board shall be deemed to have satisfied all applicable regulations of the zoning resolution. These are the nine gaming proposals. In New York City, the four highlighted projects represent the projects that needed additional actions outside of the text amendment. All four projects have been certified, and one was recently approved by the city council. All applications must be submitted to the state by July 27, which also starts the Community Advisory Committee process, also known as the CAC.

All projects must meet the gaming board requirement that gaming applications have local zoning approvals when the board receives a CAC approved application in September. Each individual CAC will hold public hearings and solicit feedback and testimony on the applications. And the CACs must vote on the applications by September 30, and they must have at least two thirds majority to approve and submit the project to the gaming board. And quickly, just some background on Coney Island. It's long been a resort and amusement area since the 1800s.

The Boardwalk Wonder Wheel and Cyclone opened in the '20s. There, we went through a urban renewal process under Robert Moses in the 50s. Here's a site plan of the project on four blocks and connected by the two bridges, one over Stillwell and one over West 12th. The development site is bounded by Surf Avenue to the North, Wonder Wheel Way to the South, West 15th Street to the West, and then Jones Walk and Bowery to the East. The proposed development is in a C-seven commercial district within the Coney Island Special District.

Here is the Department of Finance tax map with the proposed volume and street mappings. The development site is outlined in red on this tax map. The two areas in purple represent the demap volume of air related to the two bridges crossing, one on Steelwell and one on West 12th. These would connect the developments together. The striped purple and white indicate the location of the proposed grade change on Steelwell.

And the blue area is the portion of Bowery which is proposed to be demapped. Here's an illustration of the proposed development. The baseball stadium and the Thunderbolts are on the left side of the illustration. The boardwalk and the beach are obviously in the front. The proposed hotel and casino are centrally located on this illustration, as is the gaming and parking area. There will be Ground Floor retail throughout the site. So just to give you the quick details of the proposed development, it's a total floor area of 1,300,000 square feet. Casino is approximately 350,000 square feet. Hotel is approximately 250,000 square feet. They have a convention center, general retail, a food hall, event space.

They have over 100,000 square feet of open rooftop space. And they have nearly half a million square feet of parking. So here we have the site plan with the heights of end uses. So this illustration, we're looking south towards the water in this one. The other previous one was looking towards the north.

The hotel and convention center is the tallest building in the development with the hotel having 43 stories and reaching a height of four zero three feet, not including the mechanicals. The light blue color represents the convention center, and that is mostly located underneath the hotel, but is also on the two levels of the bridge crossing West 12th Street connecting to the casinos and the parking. In the darker green color, can see the Stillwell Avenue, which is labeled public open space. This is the area that is proposed to be a new pedestrianized Stillwell Gateway. The bridge over Stillwell Avenue would have three levels, including one for vehicles, two levels for gaming, and then an open rooftop.

So one of the main features of the project is that in addition to transportation and streetscape improvements, the applicant is proposing to take the 100 foot wide Stillwell Avenue and turn it into a significant pedestrianized walkway and thoroughfare. So here's the image of Stillwell with Nathan's on the right side of the image. And here is a night vision illustration. The applicant is proposing to transform this area of Stillwell into a 100 foot wide pedestrian gateway entrance into the subdistrict line with greenery, step seats, and other amenities. Additionally, they're proposing a grade change on this section.

According to the applicant, that would provide a superior pedestrian experience and alleviate a portion of the ongoing and constant flooding in the neighborhood. Now, grade change starts at Surf Avenue with less than one foot above the existing grade. And then it moves towards the middle of Steelwell to about a 2.1 foot grade change above the existing mid block grade, and then goes back down towards Wonder Way to 9.6 feet, which is the grade at Wonder Wheel Way. So here is an illustration of the proposed area underneath the proposed pedestrian bridge at Stillwell. It gives you an idea about the scale of the walkway under the arch at about 48 feet and the 100 foot wide steel well.

Above this would be the one parking level and the two gaming levels. So in this illustration, we have a section of the emergency access. So while is pedestrianized and is no longer available to have car or truck movements, it would still be able to have emergency vehicles access and have a clear pathway through the city street. So that's what this is showing. You can also see the northern end of Steelwell, they have some landscaping proposed there.

And then towards the southern end, they have some step seats and some stairs into the proposed facility. So on this illustration, we have an illustration of the vehicle circulation routes. So, for those people who are arriving by car or wanting to park in the development, which is open to the public, the vehicular entrance would be from West 12th Street. That's over on the right side in the pink color and the kind of orange color. That's the intersection of West 12th and Surf.

And this leads to the internal kind of circular Port Cochise area. So all cars, including valet, that are parked in the facility would travel over the Stillwell Bridge and exit from Bowery and West 15th Street. And that's on the left side of the image with the orange and light blue. You can't quite see West 15th underneath the blue lines. All cars would be exiting from that area.

Taxis, Ubers, and for hire vehicles would drive in from West 12th, drop off and pick off, and leave from West 12th so they could make the circle. They had an internal loop. A total of 1,500 parking spaces would be provided within the proposed development. Loading berths are in the light green shade, and that will be located on each of the blocks. A bus pickup and drop off area will be located on the westernmost block.

And you can see the bus turn around where buses drive in and then back out in order to turn around from the site. So, moving on to the actions, the city map change. So, for Bowery, the proposal is to eliminate, discontinue, and close a portion of the Bowery. This is the blue area on the map. On West 12th Street, the proposal is for the applicant to demap and purchase a volume of air over West 12th Street related to the bridge connecting the development.

Similar for Stilwell, the applicant is proposing to demap and purchase a volume of air over Stillwell to connect the development, and then the gray change that I was referring to earlier along Stillwell in that portion on the map. So this illustration shows a section of the proposed massing of the development. It shows the extent and height of the two proposed bridges. The height of the Stillwell Bridge would be approximately 48 feet, while West 12th is only 26 feet. And then zooming in, we have this section of the proposed volume over Stillwell looking east.

It is marked with the A and includes it's a little bit faint, but you can see a dash line around the volume, which should give the applicant a degree of flexibility when they're actually designing connection between the two buildings. The volume of air proposed to be demapped begins at a lower limiting plane of approximately 56 feet and an upper limiting plane of approximately 152 feet. So similarly, this illustration shows the section looking east of the proposed volume of the bridge over 12th Street. The volume of the bridge is significantly taller than the one on Stilwell, but the street is narrower at 60 feet. The volume of air proposed to be demapped begins at a lower limiting plane of approximately 34 feet and an upper limiting plane of approximately 194 feet.

So we just have a quick slide here of the proposed improvements, transportation and public safety enhancements in the area. And post CPC certification, the applicant also announced a $200,000,000 community trust fund for community grants and neighborhood improvements. I'm sure they'll be able to talk speak to that on Wednesday. So, moving on to the community board review. Community Board thirteen in Brooklyn recommend on January 9 held a very well attended and raucous public hearing.

And on January 22, the Community Board voted against a motion to approve the application by a vote of 11 to 24 with eight abstentions. They had no conditions. Now, the borough president held a public also a well attended Iraqis public hearing on March 10. And he subsequently submitted a letter on March 14 to approve the application with conditions. I have paraphrased some of these recommendations here on the slide to highlight just a few of them.

The BPS that the applicant prepare alternative development scenarios and ask for funding to be directed towards certain neighborhood investments if they got one of the gaming license. The BP also highlighted his concerns about the convoluted and opaque procedures for the gaming applications, but noted that he believes the proposed action should not preclude it from being considered and further discussed during the state defined CAC process. And that ends my presentation. Thank you very much. I'll turn over to Commissioner Dweck.

Thank you. You noted that the applicant said they won't proceed should they not get the gaming license. Are they prohibited from proceeding or they have the option to proceed? They could proceed with a gaming application. It would just have to follow all the zoning regulations. No. No. If the gaming application if this were to be approved and the gaming application were denied, they could proceed with a hotel and No, no. No. They can't proceed.

They would have to then follow whatever. So the gaming text amendment enabled them to, if they followed the gaming facilities state board process, then their development could be approved through the zoning resolution. It would be applicable and pass all the zoning guidelines. So then if they don't, then they can't take advantage of certain uses. They have to follow the special district regulations in the zoning resolution. So there would be no more bridge, Sky Bridge? There'd be no more demapping? There'd be no hotel permit? There would be Yeah. There is no hotel permit.

There'd be no This would be similar to the Queen's Future project, where if they don't get the license, then the project doesn't move forward. I just want to be sure that this is contingent only upon them building a casino if they get approved by the state. That's right. Okay. Thank you.

Commissioner Asario? Thank you, Jerry.

Thank you so much for the presentation. I'm looking forward to asking some other questions directly to the applicant. But I just wanted to clarify two things. One is, do we have a section that shows the parts of Stowell that will be elevated as compared to design float elevation, the velocity zone, and maybe sandy impacted areas?

No. We I don't have a copy of that. They could possibly have one in their package. So if I could request that, maybe they could have that ready by Wednesday.

That would be wonderful. Thank you. And if possible, I know that there's limited time. And just the other quick question is the only part of steel wool that will not be elevated is where it hits WonderWheel. Correct?

It the part of Steel Wall that will be that have the gray change. That's the that's the only

part that will not, I think. Can you

clarify that? That will not be have

a gray change? That stays as is is when it hits

stays except between SURF and Wonder Wheel Way on Steelwell, which is the that section there on both sides where it says volume. That section is where they're gonna raise it from approximately 0.5 feet to 2.1 feet.

Okay. I'll follow-up because I'm reading the text in the package slightly differently, but I'll follow-up to just make sure I understand exactly what is being proposed. Thank you. Sure.

Okay, Stephen. Thank you very much. We'll pick this one up for public hearing on Wednesday. Thank you. All right. Let's go to seven.

The seventh item on our

agenda is a pre hearing review of the zoning map and zoning text amendments, special permit and a CPC certification in Manhattan Community District 10. There were follow-up memos in your materials, and Trevor is here to present.

Thank you, Trevor, and we appreciate your subbing in today. We know we had a family emergency. So just note that for the commission. Right. That Trevor is here as substitute. We're very grateful to him for that, but we'll probably defer most

of our questions for Wednesday. But go ahead. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you, Chair.

Good afternoon, commissioners. Presenting overview of the public review period for the one forty five application in Harlem, Manhattan Community District 10, and to answer the project c CPC public hearing this Wednesday. And as the chair hopefully noted, I'll be punting nearly all questions to the applicant. On December 2, this application for zoning map amendment, tax amendment, special permit, certification was certified as complete by the city planning commission. The proposed actions if approved would result in a three building 12 FAR mixed use development on West 145th Street between Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard and Lennox Avenue containing nine eighty six dwelling units, two ninety one of which would be permanently income restricted pursuant to mandatory inclusionary housing as well as community facility and retail uses.

This presentation will briefly summarize the resolution on the proposed actions adopted by Manhattan Community Board ten, the Manhattan Borough President's recommendation, as well as detail minor adjustments to the proposed development made by the applicant team in response to public feedback. A brief recap of the requested actions. They include a zoning map amendment to rezone portions of an existing CA3 zoning district and R72 zoning district and C14 commercial overlay that encompass the development site to a C46 zoning district. The text amendment is a zoning text amendment to appendix f to designate a mandatory inclusionary housing area coterminously with the rezoning area. There's the third action is a zoning special permit to modify height and setback regulations to allow a non residential portion of a tower that is the proposed banquet hall, which you may remember to penetrate the applicable sky exposure plane.

The fourth action is a zoning certification to allow one additional curb cut on a narrow street for a total of two curb cuts on West 144th Street. A fifth action, a special permit to waive or reduce required parking spaces was terminated on December 12 by the department. A bit more on that last action. Following this application's certification on December 2, the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity citywide text amendment was adopted by the city council. This, as you all know, adopted, this zoning text eliminated off street parking requirements for market rate housing in certain transit rich geographies of the city known as the inter transit zone, which encompasses Manhattan Community District 10.

The certified application had included a zoning special permit action to reduce required parking associated with the proposed development from two seventy four space two seventy one spaces to 40 spaces pursuant to ZR 74,533. The adoption of CDBS eliminated all parking requirements associated with the proposed actions, therefore making the special permit superfluous. The special permit was subsequently terminated. One last note on this, CHO preserves the option to add parking in new buildings and the applicant team has stated their intention to provide 40 parking spaces voluntarily. On to public review.

Following the referral application at the start of the public review period, Manhattan Community Board ten facilitated two public meetings in partnership with the applicant team in which members of the public, community board members and elected officials were invited to comment on the project and pose questions. These public hearings were held on 12/19/2024 and 01/16/2025. Furthermore, on February 5 sorry, furthermore, Manhattan Community Board ten held an additional community forum on January 25. These three public events drew more than 500 members of the public combined. On 02/05/2025 at General Board, Manhattan Community Board ten adopted a resolution to disapprove the requested actions with conditions by a vote of 19 supporting, 10 opposing and five abstaining.

The Board's conditions included real high level recap, a reduction of the proposed tower height for Buildings A And B from four zero seven feet to three eighty feet to mitigate shadow and urban design impacts. Next, the Board maintained the planned 6,500 roughly square feet of community facility space would be insufficient for a project of this scale and recommended a minimum of 15,000 square feet of community facility use. Next, given the proximity of the development site to the flood plain, CB10 recommended implementation of dry and wet flood proofing consistent with the city's zoning for coastal flood resiliency framework. Finally, CB10 requested the applicant team clarify the intended use of the 40 parking spaces proposed to be provided below grade. Sorry, there's actually a couple more.

CB10 requested that the income restricted units generated pursuant to mandatory inclusionary housing be distributed evenly throughout the two residential buildings and that access to building amenities be available to all tenants. CB10's final condition was the development of a comprehensive legally binding and enforceable community benefits agreement. The proposed community benefits were far ranging and largely unrelated to land use considerations, so I'm not detailing them here. On 02/28/2025, the Manhattan Borough President recommended approval of the application with the following conditions that the applicant address the concerns and recommendations of the community board as outlined in their submitted recommendation and that the applicant execute the community benefits agreement with the approval of the community board, council member, office of Manhattan Borough President and relevant nonprofits and city agencies. This CBA was included in the package submitted to the Commission.

The Borough President's final condition was adherence to a Memorandum of Understanding executed between the applicant and the borough president on February 14. Under this MOU, the applicant commits at its sole cost to negotiate with local government officials, HPD and non profit partners to secure funding for the enhanced affordability plan, which was first unveiled by the applicant team at the first of CB10's public hearings and which outlines the provision of additional income restricted units at various affordability levels beyond the requirements of the MIH through the use of additional subsidy. On to adjustments that were made by the applicant team to the proposed development following certification. The applicant made some minor changes to the development following certification in response to feedback gathered during public review. As these modifications do not impact the project's total floor area, number of dwelling units or building envelope, they fall within the project's land use scope as certified by the City Planning Commission.

These modifications included a reallocation of floor area in Building B, which you can see at bottom left is the revised floor area breakdown and top left is the original floor area schedule to achieve a reallocation of floor area in Building B to achieve roughly 15,000 square feet of community facility use. Similarly, the proposed unit mix has been adjusted to achieve 30 additional family size units and you can see the revised unit mix at bottom right. Furthermore, the text amendment to Appendix F now specifies MIH Option two, which requires that 30% of units must be affordable to households earning on average 80% of AMI or two ninety one out of the project's projected nine sixty eight dwelling units. We've already recapped this, I'm going to move on. This slide depicts the tentative unit mix under the enhanced affordability plan, which I referenced just now.

This is a non zoning affordability plan aimed at doubling the number of income restricted units beyond those that are required pursuant to MIH for a total of nearly 600 income restricted units as opposed to the roughly 300 that would be required under MIH. The applicant also detailed some commitments to energy sustainability and resiliency that I won't detail too much here, but you can find in the materials. Similarly, they've been working with the community and local stakeholders to iron out the details of the CBA, and you can see some high level bullets on what this is slated to include. And that concludes the review of the public review period for 01/1945.

Great. Thank you very much, Trevor. We appreciate it. And, okay. Commissioner Goodrich?

I just wanted to clarify. So over I know it's a little additional in addition to the MIH. So overall, what percent of the overall units will be income restricted affordable housing?

Under Enhanced Affordability Plan? Yes, the total. She wants to

know the total, which is the 98 of 91 of nine sixty eight. Is that correct? That's correct. So more than half.

More than 50%?

Yes.

Okay. And then and then I have a question about under the enhanced one. I saw that it goes above goes into the middle income.

So I mean, is that do I have that right? So I

think part of what the what one of the original issues with this was the affordability and if it would be too high. So does the enhanced income restriction also include above 120 AMI, which would be like 6 figures for one person?

I don't think I can speak to Commissioner Bozard. But Commissioner Bozard.

May not have been here at the beginning when I noted that Trevor is here as a replacement for us on this project. So we should let's pose that to the applicant on Wednesday, if that's okay. But I think that's a good question. And it looks to me like it does as the short answer to the question based on what I'm looking at on this chart. But we can ask them that on Wednesday. Did you have other questions for Trevor or should we hold? Okay, all right. Yes, Commissioner Benjamin?

My question was just are we adopting the enhanced plan that the applicant proposed? Or are we adopting the application as it was presented to the department?

That's an interesting legal question. That probably bears clarifying since the MIH is really the scope of this body. We I don't think there's any standing to be to enhance affordability. Yeah.

This is would be approving the MIH portion of this. And then The the

90 something?

Yes. 291 income restricted units under option two.

And that where they were all in Building B?

I don't know. I think I'll they're ask the applicant. Yeah. Let's bear, Trevor, this one. But let's ask on Wednesday for sure.

But so the applicant should be prepared on Wednesday. I just wanna understand because there were a number of permutations in the enhanced plan that were not present in the submitted plan including the number of larger apartments, etcetera.

Okay. You said it out loud. Hopefully, they're listening and we'll certainly relay it back to the applicant too. Thank you, Commissioner. Anybody else want to go ahead, Commissioner Matt.

Yeah. Just a quick I guess I would just ask the department maybe not you, Trevor, specifically, but just to verify that this is something HPD is willing to subsidize. We have some grounding in whether I assume the developer is not going to be contributing the additional affordable housing units as a cross subsidy of some kind on this project, that it's going be coming from public resources. So it should be good to verify that. And I guess there's a small technical matter of what if this is actually a real proposal, then I would imagine the EIS actually need to get updated to reflect the lower AMIs because there are some day care impacts that go into lower AMI units. I think it is worth checking on that question.

Yes. We should get clarity on the point about the HPD piece of this. But let's talk about what the implication of that is for the environmental review. And Stephanie's here to answer that.

Sure. So, Stephanie Schuler, Director of Environmental here at City Planning. The EIS so we used a technical memorandum to a prior FEIS for this application. So it was very similar to a prior application where we assessed the differences to that application. In the tech memo process, the so we looked at the units for environmental purposes at or below 80% AMI, which is what's used for child care as a proxy for the federal poverty level.

And so that number was constant. And so you can see the middle income is not considered in the affordability calculations for SEEKR. But we'll make sure that the units at or below 80 AMI are accurately considered in the environmental.

Thank you, Commissioner. Okay. With that, thank you, Trevor, for filling in. We appreciate you very much. We'll pick this one up at the public hearing on Wednesday. Let's move on to item eight.

The eighth item on our agenda is a review of a general project plan in Manhattan Community District four. The draft letter to ESCC was included in your materials. If there are any questions, Abigail is here.

Any questions?

Okay.

So on this one, I'm going to seek a sent by a voice vote to send a letter to ESD. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, nay. Okay. Thank you. Motion carries. Let's move on to the next.

Future votes for consideration on Wednesday, March 19. First, we have 5445 Palisade Avenue SNAT authorization in the Bronx Feeney District 8. Also, have prepared reports on 160 One-one Jamaica Avenue ACS office acquisition. Mia is on Zoom to present.

Hello. Thank you, commissioner and commission. The department of city planning staff supports the applicant's proposal to acquire office space at 16101 Jamaica Avenue. The administration for children's services, Queen Zombie Borough office has been operating out of the space since 2008, and a lease renewal would allow them to continue their services uninterrupted. The proposed space at 16101 Jamaica Avenue meets their operational needs. Its transit access and central location assist the work of the administration without impacting the character of the local neighborhood. A CPC report reflecting this recommendation has been prepared for the commission. Thank you.

Great. Thank you.

Thank you.

Also, reports have been prepared on 166 Kings Highway rezoning and 707399 Empire Boulevard rezoning. Lastly, for future votes, staff have prepared reports on Atlantic Avenue mixed use plan. There was a follow-up memo in your materials, and Jonah is here to present.

All right, Jonah. Welcome back. All right. I know it's been a long day, so I'll try to be brief.

Right. While this is booting up, I just want to read my title slide. So ahead of Wednesday's vote, we wanted to provide a staff recommendation and also respond to questions raised at the last posturing follow-up, specifically regarding a requested CPC text modification to better facilitate the mix of light industrial and residential uses, which we've also included in a memo in our packages, as Sarah mentioned. So first and foremost, we strongly recommend approving AIM UP, which we believe is a critical opportunity to re envision an industrially zoned area in Central Brooklyn for housing and job growth, anchored along one of Brooklyn's widest and most prominent corridors and in close proximity to public transit and major job hubs. It builds on nearly a decade of engagement and rooted in a community vision report.

We believe AimUp's a holistic plan projected to create approximately 4,600 new homes, of which fourteen forty would be income restricted and over 800,000 square feet of space for businesses with approximately 2,800 jobs. The department strongly feels that the current zoning M11 has stifled growth and simply out of sync with the area's needs, resulting in many vacant lots or lots used as parking, warehousing or self storage while being surrounded by residential neighborhoods where demand for housing has skyrocketed over the past few decades, but with limited capacity to increase supply. While we recognize that AMUP alone cannot fully alleviate this crisis, we feel strongly it represents a key part of the solution with meaningful steps to ease pressure, maximize opportunities for deep affordable housing on public sites, and also partnerships with HPD to channel resources to better support tenants and homeowners in the area. So with respect to the land use actions, first, we believe the zoning map changes are carefully laid out to orient the highest density along Atlantic Avenue, a 120 foot wide corridor that provides access to light and air, while stepping down to the North South Avenues and mid block side streets. The proposed zoning is also targeted to increase affordable housing capacity on the limited city and nonprofit owned sites available, as well as allow for future improvements to the Bedford Atlantic Armory, such as for job training or workforce development.

And then to meet long standing goals around job growth and mixing uses, the corridors will be required to have ground floor nonresidential uses. And then on the mid blocks, we're excited to employ a new tool to incentivize one or

two floors of space for jobs.

And then to address a number of unique conditions, the text amendment establishes a special district with important design controls to set back buildings along Atlantic Avenue that will improve the sidewalk conditions, require buildings wider than 100 feet to break up the facade and provide articulation. And then encourage large sites to apply for a plaza bonus to create new public accessible open space. So now as we want to turn our attention to the mixed use zoning, as we discussed a couple of weeks ago, we are proposing that the CPC modify our special district tax to further strengthen the approach around safely mixing light industrial with residential. First, there were questions about what light industrial uses are prohibited to locate with residential today under the current zoning. Under the current MX rules, all light industrial uses must meet performance standards.

And then there's a second layer. I won't name the zoning section number, but it states that if there's a commercial or industrial use that has a state based DEC permit or a city based DEP permit with environmental rating of A, B, or C, or that use needs to file a risk management plan under the city's right to know law, that industrial or commercial use is simply prohibited or precluded from locating residential. These ratings are noted in the administrative code, but are really referred in the state law, which are based on a rating system tied to air quality containments. So while this provision serves as a critical goal in protecting residents from environmental hazards connected with industrial uses, in practice, we've heard that it effectively bars most industrial and commercial uses that discharge any measurable air quality contaminants from locating with residential. For example, C rating indicates an air contaminant whose discharge may result in, quote, a localized adverse effects of an aesthetic or nuisance nature.

So while we do not have

an exact

data on the number of businesses, from speaking with organizations and business owners, our understanding is the vast majority of industrial and some businesses such as coffee roasters, small scale manufacturers, or production spaces are simply unable to overcome the reading system and, therefore, unable to locate with residential despite meeting other code requirements, performance standards, and also having ability to install physical control and technology standards that protect residents from air emissions, but also noise and other environmental hazards. So building on these lessons from a mixed industrial and residential project at 803 Rockaway Avenue in Brownsville, which created another pathway through a restrictive declaration process, the department recommends the CPC modify the special district to include an option for chair certification, providing an alternative environmental compliance pathway for mixed industrial buildings. To reiterate, the e designation would permit light industrial uses to co locate in the same building or side by side with residential, provided that an applicant is able to demonstrate the building design protects occupants from air quality, noise, and other environmental hazards, applicants would have to submit a report from a licensed architect or engineer that analyzes the environmental effects of the proposed rules, which would then be reviewed by DCP and other agencies, such as DEP or OER.

And then an e designation would codify these custom requirements, which could be an installation of a vapor barrier, separated ventilation systems, and other building controls. This would remain heat of ignition, I should say, would remain on the property and in DOE's system from permitting through construction and occupancy. So we're not removing the

e designation, but the intent is to

keep it in place, especially if there are any changes over time. This certification would not be a replacement or a substitute for any code based rules or performance standards. We just wanna be crystal clear about that, but meant to be in addition to those requirements. For instance, many types of industrial equipment require DEP permits independent of what zoning requires. Compared to a restricted declaration, we believe that an e designation and certification process will provide a much more transparent, standardized method for allowing these users to safely mix.

While we believe that the universe of potential industrial and residential vertically integrated buildings remains very small and experimental, we believe that it's appropriate to pilot this approach in AIM UP, given the community's strong interest in supporting this mix of uses, its relatively small geography, and because of the stated interest of one owner, GMBC, who has been a strong partner throughout the process. As this project and others materialize and potentially seek this certification, we do anticipate strong collaboration between the applicant, DCP, DEP, OER, to ensure that air quality analyses and any resultant design solutions are clear, enforceable, and protective. And then also that we continue learning from best practices for future projects.

All

right. So now just going back to our standard staff recommendation, I just want to quickly note to maximize new affordable housing, aim up includes site specific actions that would create three eighty one affordable homes at two HPD sites and one nonprofit site owned by Vacation Network. At a DOE parking lot at 457 Nostrand and a New York City Transit owned site at 1110 Atlantic Avenue. We're proposing disposition actions with the goal of advancing an RFP process after AIM UP is approved. So these are also sites that are under consideration, but we don't have the final approval yet for those.

Well, 1024 Fulton Street is a state owned site and not subject to any land use actions. Its development has been in collaboration with the city and state as part of a broader effort to unlock more affordable housing within the area. So here, we just want to note to that project as part of a kind of larger effort. And then also note that HPD has been a close and proactive partner, throughout the process. And just to give an example of that, as part of their ongoing efforts around preservation, they're doing another round of canvassing the tenants throughout the area.

And we'll be holding a series of tenant and homeowner, events or I should say, workshops, but also classes as well during the spring. And then just a quick note, while many capital and program based investments are subject to available funding and will be reviewed soon with city council, We wanna highlight projects already underway, including DOT Street improvement projects, a $24,000,000 investment in Saint Andrew's Playground. And then as I said, HPD's ongoing tenant outreach and anti displacement measures, all of which we think is a down payment on our work, to demonstrate prod progress to both the commission and to the broader community with more investments to come. So in short, we strongly recommend for approval, which we believe will transform a section of Atlantic Avenue to support mixed income, housing, substantial, job growth, and other investments, in an area of great public transit access and building on near a decade long planning effort. So with that, happy to answer any questions.

And Carolyn is also here from our economic development.

Great. Thank you very much. Before I go to Commissioner Benjamin, let me just see if I can nail down for myself the e designation question, which maybe Commissioner Benjamin is also interested in. Okay. The applicant analyzes the effects. One, they codify the environmental requirements in the e designation.

That's correct.

They submit a report to the Department of City Planning for certification at that point? Yes.

And I welcome Carolyn. Close.

The application for the certification action would include the analysis of the proposed uses and the environmental effects. The department, upon working with our colleagues across government, would confirm that the analysis and its proposed design requirements have no are equivalently protective. And the certification itself results in the codification of the e designation. So the e designation, as you all know, is put in place as the result of a department action. So in this case, the action is the certification.

Okay. And at what point is there a conversation with the Office of Environmental Remediation?

At the point at which the applicant submits the analysis and the proposed design solutions. I welcome you, Stephanie, if you have anything. Jump up if not. Okay.

And then the e designation remains on the property?

Correct.

Right. Thank you. Commissioner Benjamin.

Thank you for

trying to ask my question. But as you can tell, I really appreciate the department's efforts in this regard, but I still have questions. The first is, how is this and why is this different from the little e that gets mapped? Since this will not be a zoning mapping action, it's not clear to me what it will be. This is

a little e. This is a little e.

So what will be mapped on the zoning map?

We don't use the zoning map anymore, but it is codified through zoning actions that the commission takes and codified in the zoning resolution and with the Office of Remediation and the Department of Buildings. So it is the same as the little e.

Although the little e is limited in what things it can be for?

Yes. Is this what Jonas said was that it could be for air quality noise or others? Hazardous materials, for example, but those three categories are what the e designation is.

Could it go beyond what is the current little e? For instance, if I had a water issue?

Not without changes to the e designation program. So it is limited to those governing categories.

Okay. Because, commissioner, just to clarify again, zoning section one twenty three twenty two that we're referring to is covering air quality and hazardous material issues. So the environmental compliance alternatives are focused on alternatives to the specific provisions that are air quality and hazmat in those sections.

Okay. I was just really referring to Jonah, saying, and other. So sorry, Jonah.

No. That's appreciated.

When a project comes through, it would, the applicant by and large will not know who is going to and what business is going to occupy the Ground Floor space. So your assumption is that there will be, if necessary, a series of zoning actions and then somewhere else down the road would come this request for certification?

So the zoning actions are what you're taking in AIM UP, right, which are already allowing for industrial uses, but in this case now introducing residential. So they trigger this additional level of environmental compliance, of which we are creating the alternative to here. So no zoning actions would be needed, assuming that the project is as of right under aim up rules. For the certification to achieve the environmental alternative pathway, then they would come with an application for that would assume a program of uses. So in the case of 803 Rockaway, where there was a zoning action necessary, but it's an equivalent circumstance here.

We would we in that case, the applicant brought forth a assumed group of uses, and that is what the environmental design requirements were based on, and that is what is codified in their restrictive declaration. Here too, we would have the opportunity to look at a grouping of uses and to codify an e designation that is specific to a grouping of uses.

And if it went beyond if the applicant, got a tenant who did not fall within those, would the certificate would they have to come back for a new certificate?

Uses would still be subject to the baseline one twenty three requirements. So those other uses that were not covered under the e designation and the certification would not be pre entitled to the alternative compliance pathway.

So they would have to come back for another chair certification?

If they wanted to expand that range of uses. But again, I think we would imagine that some an applicant that is looking to build out industrial space would generally be looking to do the certification for a range of uses that covered its planned tenancy. Does that cover every possible circumstance? Perhaps not. But certainly, they'd be designing not for one specific tenant necessarily, but for a range of woodworking, coffee roaster, a grouping of tenants that they

would expect would use the space.

Although the air permits might be diff we can just concerned about how we capture after the first application that there is somebody else in there doing something else.

I think that's an ongoing challenge throughout the city. But again, the the air permit process would still be in place. And this would provide an additional flag that does not exist today for any actions on that site to be identified by the e designation. And that's a that's a tool we don't have in place today.

And would it cover impacts on an adjacent residence? For instance, if the air permit required me to have a spray booth, and I was going to put my venting system outside my building wouldn't affect anybody in my building, but the residents next door could be affected. How would that

The draft text for the certification does ensure that both residents in the building and surrounding properties are protected. So that it does hit both of those intentionally. Okay. Thank you.

You. Commissioner, Vice Chair Knuckles?

This may be related to the prior question, I'm not sure. But you mentioned coffee roaster and woodworking. So what other which is considered light manufacturing, I assume. So what are those the only kinds of light manufacturing that would trigger this mechanism?

No. It's and it's really unknown. Maybe Carolyn has a better sense. But there are things like furniture making, jewelry making, other kind of small scale production that might have Bigger. Emissions and that go beyond what would be as of right in the rating system that Jonah described. So it's this is definitely not exhaustive. We're just kind of using a couple that people might have a general sense of what the outputs might be, but we're not limiting it by use. And the zoning is proposed to be written in a way that's just if you do not meet the rating system, so that we're really not being constraining, that we're trying to create opportunities for flexibility in the future.

So give me an example of what would be as of right under this.

Well, I think, for example, a coffee roaster is a named use that is as of right under the zoning. The issue is that the coffee roaster, based on the flow rate of the emissions of the equipment that it may use, may trigger these additional state regulations. So the use coffee roaster, is an approved use. The equipment that they use determines whether or not they can meet this environmental standard. And the same is true of a woodworker, and the same is true of a bakery. The nature of the equipment and those standards are what is triggering their ability to comply with environmental law with these particular environmental rules or no. Understood. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Vice Chairman. Commissioner Ossario?

Thank you, Chair. I had a quick question. I know that we're having a briefing tomorrow with the team, I appreciate that. We were literally just discussing this with Alex. But I'm wondering if you can just for the record, help me understand why is the recommendation post by the Board President and by myself about requiring some type of manufacturing or industrial in the ground floor out of scope?

Oh,

do you mean with respect to the the mid block areas? And In in the MX, like, why why can't we require industrial in the MX? A portion or a percentage of the users to be industrial?

So the the the heart of the issue, and this is something that we're still going through internally, so I don't wanna give, like, a official payment on record at this point. But the the issue relates to the use regulations that we've modified or didn't modify in the special district. Because the special district did not modify underlying use regulations, specifically, like parsing out certain types of industrial or commercial uses, that would it would be out of scope for both oh, oh, sure. Cool. I'll I'll finish my statement.

Yes. Finish Our understanding is that it would be out of scope for both the commission and council to establish new regulations from out of scope from a I just wanna be clear from a land use application perspective, not necessarily an environmental.

Okay. Yeah. No. It it will more to to discuss on this. I just I think that it will be useful to explain that in the report more explicitly. I'm concerned about that and would love to discuss further. Don't mean to hold this down, but I think that that's something that I would like to understand.

At the risk of belaboring a future conversation as well, Commissioner, I just wanted to add helpfully that today, there are no requirements for

an industrial use on the site.

And so when we're thinking about the sort of delta that is created by what is on the site today, what are we proposing, and usually scope is the space in between those, It's important that there's no requirement for an industrial use on the site today, right? So somebody is not somebody could build today a commercial use, somebody could build a community facility is under the existing zoning. And so a requirement would be pulling back something that is existing for those property owners.

Thank you. I think that generally makes sense. And I understand that even though this was brought up a certification as a recommendation, I understand that there is so much we can do right now. But just as well as we are requiring non industrial ground floor uses in the proposal, we could have required that or proposed that. Well, maybe I'll And I understand that. Sorry, just to finish that idea is that I understand that a lot of it is really coming from City of for economic opportunities. So in other words, we're just building on existing requirements, so to speak. So we're not

proposing think that's right. Legally, could have proposed. We did not because based in part on our tools from CDVS for economic opportunity, we built other kinds of tools, none of which have a requirement because we think that that is probably counterproductive to facilitating development, but some of which do have other industrial incentives built into them that were not applied in this circumstance for the reasons we described last time.

Thank you. That's useful. Thank you. So more to discuss on the briefing.

Thank Thank you very Thank you, Commissioner. Thank you, Jonah. Okay. Thank you very much. We're going to be voting on this one. I'd say it's not a surprise that I hear the Department of City Planning supports the AIM UP plan. Thank you to all of you for all of your efforts to date. And Jonah, thank you in particular to you for your explanations today and to the entire team. So thank you. Next.

Okay. For post hearing follow ups, first we have Western Rail Yard Modifications, which had a public hearing as of February 19 public meeting. Abby is here to present.

Great. Thank you very much. And Abby, welcome back.

Thank you. Good afternoon, Commissioners. This is the second post hearing presentation for Western Railyard Modifications and Mapping Action. In this week's briefing packet, the department shared a memo with the Commission following up with information on questions asked at previous review sessions. Also in the briefing packet is a March 14 letter to the Commission responding to questions raised at the public hearing from the applicant and a deck showing the alternative scenario, Site C podium design update.

This is in addition to the letter that the applicant shared on February 28 from their engineering team. I will review the information shared in the engineering firm's letter, as well as the updated site C podium in the alternative scenario in upcoming slides. As I just mentioned, the Department shared a memo with the Commission responding to questions the Commission has raised, which is summarized on this slide. First, there are no e designations recorded on the property associated with the 2009 rezoning. Instead, the environmental requirements are recorded in the restrictive declaration and in Appendix C of the zoning resolution.

Because publicly owned lots do not receive e designations for noise and air quality, the department has determined that any environmental requirements related to noise, air quality, and hazardous materials associated with the proposed project would be recorded in the RD. Next, wind was analyzed in the FEIS associated with the 2009 rezoning, as well as in the DEIS associated with the current proposed project. In the proposed project, wind conditions at most areas at the ground level of the development site are expected to be appropriate for pedestrian usage during the summer and fall, but not during the winter and spring. The department is working with the applicant team to add requirements to the Public Access Areas Design Standards in the RD, which would be used for a future chair certification to ensure that the open space design accommodates pedestrian comfort, including things like windscreens, partitions, and planters. Finally, the public school entrance as currently designed meets the NYC Building Code's flood resistant construction standards.

The department understands that the applicant is working to determine if it's possible to move the entrance above the DFE and supports these efforts. Also, the distance between gaming facilities and schools is not analyzed as part of SEEKER. The department is not aware of any regulations regarding the distance between schools and gaming facilities. On February 28, the applicant shared a letter from their engineering firm, Thornton Tomasetti, responding to questions from the Commission during the public hearing. The engineers explained that every twenty four hours the LIRR must visually inspect the continuous undercarriage of most of the trains stored on both sides.

The majority of the 30 tracks are separated by walkways at track level. The letter confirms that the planned platform structure over the Western Rail Yard requires LIR approval. When the current configuration of the rail yard was established in the 1980s, certain tracks were spaced an additional two feet apart to allow for two foot wide columns for a future overbuild. The 2009 zoning plan accounted for these columns. But the firm explained that by 2017, structural studies determined that the columns must be wider than two feet to meet the current seismic criteria and support the platform for the tower massing of the four northern sites.

A design was developed using three to four feet wide concrete shear walls to support the towers, which then extended down between the tracks. In the image on the left, you can see the tracks with an overlay of the 2,009 building site locations. The red lines indicate the reduced clearance created by the columns in the proposed structural design, which the firm said was rejected by LIRR in 2020. The LIRR determined that the cumulative impacts to inspections would diminish the functionality of the yard for train operations. In the image on the right, you can see an overlay of the twenty twenty four building sites on the development site with density concentrated to the north at Site C.

The engineering firm said this configuration would enable a structural steel design instead of concrete to distribute, like, loads across a horizontal steel structure above the platform with two and a half feet thick columns at the track level. It would also take advantage of the cleaning platform, which can accommodate wider columns. And to the south, the firm says having no building sites in the middle eliminates the impact to some tracks and allows for unimpeded LIRR operations for other tracks. The firm says the proposed design significantly reduces overall impacts to LIRR operations at the track level and complies with their standard of no more than four simultaneous track closures. The ultimate design and configuration of the platform, plenum, and location of support columns will be subject to future LIR approval.

This is another image showing the 2,009 platform structure on the left and the current proposed platform structure on the right. And this final diagram shows the lack of adequate clearance for train inspections with a three foot column in the infantry on the left, and an increased clearance for inspections with a more narrow column up to two and a half feet wide in the image on the right. And finally, staff have continued to work with the applicant team on the podium design at Site C in the alternative scenario to address comments and questions raised regarding its size and configuration. In both the 2,009 approved site plan on the left and in the updated alternative scenario site plan on the right, you can see a mid block connection that is 60 feet wide and open to the sky, with the mid block connection zone hatched in red. In the updated design, the mid block connection zone would be located at least 235 feet east of 12th Avenue and at least 265 feet west of 11th Avenue.

You can also see in the updated design a new recessed area connecting the mid block connection to the open space and a new notch at the southeast corner. This image of the SITC podium is illustrative and reflects further updates to the design. The lighter gray indicates the base of the podium before it sets back. And the darker gray shows the taller portions of the podium. The dashed outlines in light gray indicate potential locations of the three of three towers.

You can see the mid block connection in green, and the 15 foot setback around most of the podium is continued on either side of the connection. There is a recess area at the southern end of the mid block connection, also in green, that's 180 feet wide, 60 feet deep, and open to the sky. The recess area could shift anywhere around the mid block connection, so completely to the left, right, or centered on the connection. This generous recess further breaks up the mass of the podium and creates a more inviting transition for the pedestrian between the podium and the open space. The recess area on the southeast corner is 20 feet five feet wide and a 110 feet deep and builds on the on an existing recess in the certified design that was covered above two stories.

The updated design makes this recess open to the sky, further reducing the scale of the podium and inviting pedestrians from 11th Avenue into the open space in the center of the site. Another update to the design not showed or not shown, but that would be incorporated into the design notes is a rule that any facade length greater than 300 feet would be required to incorporate a recessed area open to the sky that is 15 feet deep and 30 feet wide facing the open space. And this image shows updates to the heights of the podium. The base height of the mid block connection is 100 feet, and the height wraps around to the recess area on the southern end of the connection. The overall podium envelope has been reduced with the maximum base height lowered from 150 feet to 120 feet for much of the podium starting February feet west of 11th Avenue.

The maximum building height for the podium has also been reduced in the same area from 200 feet to 180 feet. The outlines in yellow show the certified envelope in contrast to the updated design in white. And here we have an illustrative massing of the certified podium envelope on the left and the updated design on

the right.

In each image, potential towers are depicted above the podium, and only the footprints are seen of sites a and b to the south of the development site. So that way you have an unobstructed view of the podium. I'll note that this image does not show the facade articulation requirements that are included in the certified design control notes. The department will be working with the applicant to maintain these requirements and reconcile any inconsistencies between the certified design and the updated proposal. Staff have reviewed the applicant's updated proposal, and the department recommends the Commission modify the special permit in the alternative scenario to incorporate this updated Site C podium design.

The mid block connection combined with the additional recesses at the mid block connection and southeast corner, and the reduced podium envelope address comments from the commission and the public. The updated design establishes a scale and proportion of the through block connection that is appropriate for pedestrians. It also ensures a clear legibility of the through block connection that assists in an intuitive navigation of the public realm. Most importantly, the updated design provides greater articulation of the podium that improves the relationship to the open space and reduces the perceived scale. And quickly, here's an illustrative mapping of Site C of the proposed project in the alternative scenario that reflects the design update.

The image on the left is facing Northeast, and the image on the right is facing Northwest. These images show a possible configuration of Site C and not the full building envelope. And again, you can I just want to note that you can't see sites A and B in these images? That concludes my presentation, and I'm happy to take any questions.

Great. Thanks, Abby. Much improved. Thank you for that. Okay. Let me see if there are questions. Commissioner Mann?

Yes. I didn't see in the package and maybe I missed this. The response to the ESD question around the development side just to the north of this. The applicant represented the hearing that they thought they had been having constructive conversations with ESD, but I didn't really see any indication of that. So I was just curious if there's any more information there.

The latest we have is from the applicant's letter. This is from this most recent packet just indicating that they are still in talks and and and consider those to be productive so far.

Okay. And have

we have we talked to ESD directly

to understand? We don't have a

latest update, but I can follow-up with them and get that to you quickly.

Yes. It seemed like just as the state's been working with us productively on some of these rezonings. It seems like it would be nice to follow-up with them to understand what they understood to be the status of their concerns. And just on the mid block, sort of carving up of the podium, what happens on the northern terminus of that mid block? Like how do you get down to grade?

Sorry, can you So, if

you're walking through that mid block and you get to the end of it, you do you step down to

the street level?

Or This is a great point. So, as part of this application, I know we haven't been focusing on it much in these conversations, but we are the the applicant is proposing to elevate West 33rd Street. And so the through bot connection will get them directly onto the street, which will be at that new grade. Okay.

And then