West and East Village, Chelsea, Soho, Noho, Little Italy, Chinatown and Lower East Side, Since 1933
Volume 77, Number 17 | Sept. 26 – Oct. 2, 2007
As high-rises sprout, feeling down and out on Bowery
By Joe Pompeo
The Zoning Task Force of Community Board 3 recently acted on concerns that the Bowery will be swallowed up by high-rise hotels and condominiums. But whether its input can help determine the fate of the historic Manhattan thoroughfare remains uncertain.
At a Sept. 17 meeting, the task force recommended that C.B. 3 inform the Department of City Planning that it is “alarmed” at the rapid pace of development and gentrification taking place on the Bowery. The full board was expected to vote on the motion Tuesday night Sept. 25. Yet, while the board’s resolutions do influence city agencies’ decisions, they are advisory only.
“It’s not going to stop the hotels from coming,” said David McWater, C.B. 3’s chairperson.
In November 2006, City Planning unveiled a Lower East Side and East Village rezoning proposal that would put an 80-foot height cap on future construction in a more than 100-block area that falls just short of the Bowery. The rezoning would allow developers to build up to 12 stories on certain wide streets, such as Houston St., as long as 20 percent of their projects include affordable housing.
Residents worry that once the rezoning takes effect, developers — unable to build to their desired heights in most of the area — will flock to the Bowery, emptying out and tearing down existing buildings to make room for large hotels, or high-rise residential complexes that can fetch much higher rents. Indeed, plans for several large Bowery developments are currently underway, including a 15-story condominium near the corner of Third St.
“[My landlord] said I should get ready to leave because he’s had offers on the building,” said Roberta Degnore, 51, who has lived in a rent-stabilized Bowery apartment between Delancey and Spring Sts. since 1980. The task force did ask that anti-tenant-harassment provisions be included in the rezoning, but City Planning has yet to add them to the proposal, McWater said.
According to City Planning, the rezoning does not encompass the Bowery, a wider avenue that is well-served by mass transit, because its “existing built character” is not consistent with the low- to medium-density form of the majority of the East Village and Lower East Side.
In light of City Planning’s stance, some residents have emphasized the need to pressure the department into making its intentions for the Bowery known.
“If [the city] doesn’t take action, then it is giving the Bowery to developers,” said Rob Hollander, 52, of Lower East Side Residents for Responsible Development. Other community groups, like the Bowery Alliance of Neighbors, or BAN, which will hold its first public meeting on Oct. 11, are also organizing to achieve protective zoning for the Bowery.
Asked about the Bowery, a City Planning spokeswoman said the department currently is focused on beginning the formal public review process for the proposed Lower East Side and East Village rezoning, so that “the community we identified as most under threat can be preserved, and new development can bring much needed affordable housing.”
The rezoning is currently undergoing an environmental impact review and the public review process is expected to begin in the spring 2008.
“Time is of the essence,” the spokesperson, Jennifer Torres, said.
Similarly, McWater cautioned residents against pushing for an immediate Bowery rezoning since it could slow down the larger rezoning process. He said the remaining areas in the board’s district that do not fall under the proposal should be approached on a smaller scale. For instance, C.B. 3 has proposed using this year’s assigned planning fellow from the Manhattan Borough President’s Office to work on a rezoning project for the Bowery between Third and Sixth Sts.
“It’s going to take a long, long time and there are going to be a lot of frustrated people,” McWater said. “We don’t have time to slow down.”
But for residents like Degnore, the rezoning of the entire Bowery is a matter for the present, not the future.
“The Bowery’s already changing,” she said. “Who’s there to stop this from happening now?”
Workers are installing a special metal mesh cladding on the New Museum, rising on the Bowery at Prince St., which is slated to open to the public on Dec. 1.
