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In the News: Changes to IPN Storefronts
••• A Tribeca Trib article about how and why small businesses are having a rough time lately includes this about the Independence Plaza North strip mall: “According to a knowledgeable source, Vornado Realty Trust has vacated its stores as part of a plan to enlarge the spaces by extending them outward to the Independence Plaza building line, an area now apparently defined by an overhang in front of the stores.”
••• “The planned West Thames Street Pedestrian Bridge, in an off-again, on-again state of bureaucratic limbo for years, is inching ever closer to reality. The project last month got the go-ahead from the Battery Park City Authority for a final payment—$750,000—toward a detailed design phase that will allow contractors to bid on the bridge, now budgeted at $27.5 million.” The opening is projected for 2017. —Tribeca Trib
••• Eater reviews Le District.
••• Edible Manhattan has an article touting Atera’s basement garden, but I heard the new chef got rid of it….
••• A resident who got backed into by a car with a bike rack on the rear (obscuring the license plate) wrote a letter to the Tribeca Trib and included a photo of the vehicle (because it sped off even though the driver knew what happened).
••• “The long goodbye is over for old Lithuanian church in Hudson Square.” —The Villager
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Ridiculous re: expanding the Vornado spaces for what? A little more retail space and less sidewalk because of it (after construction which will no doubt be noisy and uglify the strip and stretch of sidewalk even more than it is now.
Hey Vornado Realty just put a Starbucks in the Josephine space, 7 Eleven in the empty spaces between Duane Reade and the Tribeca Pizzeria space, a Domino’s in the TP space, and a chain bank ATM kiosk in the Peace & Love space and be done with it. We all know you don’t want any non-chain businesses in there so there are four tenants I’m sure you could get (watch one of their realtors copy and paste my post to show to the higherups LOL.) Get to creating Mallbeca!
I agree with your sentiments but when you are getting $220/sq foot for MalBeca (fun with French) every little foot counts… sigh…
A good analysis of the issues facing our neighborhood and does a good job of explaining all those many empty storefronts i.e. High asking rents combined with very low foot traffic
Empty storefronts are not a good thing for this neighborhood.
The landlords for the most part bought their spaces for pennies on the dollar and I hope the vast majority are smart enough not to kill the goose that laid the golden egg…
“The landlords for the most part bought their spaces for pennies on the dollar and I hope the vast majority are smart enough not to kill the goose that laid the golden egg…”
The golden egg has been accompanied by massive rises in property taxes, source of 25% of the city’s revenue. There’s no property tax relief for renewing long time store tenants at the submarket rents many legitimately enjoy (while charging market prices for their goods and services) once the lease expires. Maybe there should be.
James,
A good point there. Maybe that should be something the city looks at.
On the flip side Property taxes for everyone in this neighborhood have certainly gone up but certainly not nearly as much as the rent increases bring sought.
$220/sq foot versus previous $30-70/sq foot is certainly a lot more of an increase than property taxes alone can justify
You’re going to have to rethink your less sidewalk argument?
I don’t have to rethink anything – use common sense.
If the spaces are expanded out to the edge of the beams, the new entrances will be where the sidewalk past the beams begins hence less sidewalk.
The nice thing about the current set up is one can walk inside the beams. That’ll be gone once Vornado builds out to inside the sidewalk inside the beams.
How wide is the sidewalk now?
From the walls of the storefronts to the curb.
Again it’s nice to have sidewalk inside the beams.
Again, how wide is the sidewalk now?
“The nice thing about the current set up is one can walk inside the beams”.
Really? I have NEVER seen anyone walking along Greenwich by walking under the overhang unless it was raining. If you’re suggesting that this is something that will sorely be missed, perhaps you want to argue for keeping every single sidewalk scaffolding up permanent as well?
@lowphat: Then you’ve never seen me, because I like to walk underneath them in the shade.
As with the depressing overhang which casts a permanent and unfortunate shade, KP, it is likely that your solemn strolls will not be missed. May there be light.
Seriously, does anyone know how wide the sidewalk is that Mallbeca’s common sense speaks of?
Damn! The overhang saved me from the rain for decades…I guess I’ve got to buy myself an umbrella pretty soon. Sorry to see them go.
Independent of what goes into those storefronts, I’ll be glad to see them brought out from the gloom. Those overhangs are terrible.