Where the High Line EndsThe planned completion of a park that has become a metaphor for New York’s evolution from a place of weeds and rusting iron into a sanctuary of hip.
Advertisers Still Wary of Don ImusPlus, the latest on what’s going on at Citibank, JPMorgan, and on the Upper East Side, in our daily industry roundup.
in other news
‘Crain’s’ Introduces Us to Cute New New Yorkers, Reveals Secrets About OthersLike anyone else, we love 40-under-40 lists. Browsing them is like browsing Internet personal ads, except we don’t feel embarrassed for the people on them, because they didn’t place the ads themselves, and we don’t feel as embarrassed for ourselves, because you know, we’re not really looking. So, after we got over the searing disappointment of not being on Crain’s 40-under-40 list (for some reason they only picked rich, good-looking, successful people!), we enjoyed perusing the video profiles of some of the cute New Yorkers on it. Such as Frédéric de Narp, the CEO of Cartier North America, who gestures with his hands and appears to be totally not wearing a wedding ring is totally unfortunately married; Robert Hammond, the co-founder of Friends of the High Line, who’s so nerdy-cute that we almost forgot how much the publicity surrounding the High Line bugged us; and Pilar Guzman, the editor-in-chief of Cookie, who is so appealing that we almost forgot we hate children! This being what it is, the videos are short on juice, but we did glean a few things.
it just happened
Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff Out at City Hall, In at Bloomberg LPDan Doctoroff, who has been toiling away since 2001 as the mayor’s get-it-done man, will announce today that he will be out of City Hall by the end of the year. He’ll be named president of Bloomberg LP, reports the Times.
“Our administration and the city of New York have been incredibly lucky to have Dan in City Hall for the past six years, and I’ve personally been very lucky to have him sitting just six feet away from me,” the mayor said in a hastily scheduled news conference in the Blue Room of City Hall. “He has been a true partner, a trusted friend, and the architect of the most sweeping transformation of New York City’s environment since the days of Robert Moses.”
Doctoroff, a former investment banker who, like the mayor, earns only $1 a year for his civil service, is the deputy mayor for Economic Development and Rebuilding. He’s overseen successful projects like the High Line redevelopment and the rescue of the city’s waterfronts, including Governors Island. He was also a force behind the mayor’s ill-fated West Side Stadium and Olympic bids. Doctoroff was popular in City Hall and is credited with helping Bloomberg with much of his economic and redevelopment success. New York’s Geoffrey Gray reported that Doctoroff was planning a departure last month.
Doctoroff Is Leaving Bloomberg Administration [NYT]
Related Doctor! Give Me a Job [NYM]
in other news
André Balazs: Selling Hotels Is Standard ProcedureEver since yesterday’s little Gawker item about André Balazs selling three of his signature hotel properties (it turned out that it came from a Crain’s story), we’ve been wondering what’s up. Is our favorite hotelier and celebrity dater hard up for cash? Are delays and extra costs on his High Line–spanning Standard Hotel becoming a burden? Apparently not, according to Balazs himself. The Observer got him on the phone to talk about the transfers. “Quite frankly, we’re a little surprised about Crain’s much ado about nothing,” Balazs said. “It was financing. You know, we recently refinanced a bunch of the other properties and restructured them to take advantage of the capital markets. And these are all now stabilized properties that it’s just an opportune time to refinance them, meaning that they’ve been open long enough, and they’re steady and mature hotels.” So everything’s okay? “It’s a routine recapitalizing and restructuring [of] the underlying debt or equity. We do it all the time. We control the management and control the properties.” Hm. We liked it better when all we had to think about was whether we liked his pretty lobbies.
Andre Balazs Explains Hotel Moves: ‘We Do It All the Time’ [NYO]
Hotelier selling assets in refinancing move [Crain’s NY]
in other news
Raising the Standard
The High Line, as the headline read on Adam Sternbergh’s May cover story for New York, brings good things to life. One such good thing: André Balazs’s High Line–straddling Standard Hotel, which, according to the photo that showed up on Curbed today, seems well along its way to fruition. As it happens, a Daily Intel spy tells us it’s magnificently behind schedule and overbudget. But, then, it’s in the meatpacking district; of course it’s too expensive.
High Line Construction Chronicles: Standard Anything But [Curbed]
Related: The High Line: It Brings Good Things to Life [NYM]
party lines
Not Everyone Can Visit the High Line (Though Chris Meloni Could If He Wanted)
The first section of the High Line park isn’t scheduled to open until next spring, but sometimes it can feel like everyone has made (sort of) secret, (entirely) illegal visits to the overgrown train trestle. But at the annual Friends of the High Line summer benefit last night, we learned that even some of the High Line’s best Friends haven’t had a chance to visit. “My boyfriend was really angry that when his mom came in town I didn’t take her,” Friends co-founder Robert Hammond, who has been pushing for the park for nearly a decade, told us. “He’s like, ‘What’s the advantage of sleeping with the High Line guy if I can’t take my mom up there?’” (Of course, Hammond’s own parents have already been.) SVU star and longtime Friend Christopher Meloni hasn’t visited either. “They’ve invited me like ten times, but I’ve been working,” he said, no doubt further incensing Hammond’s boyfriend’s mom. “I don’t want them to go out of their way.” The city has to okay any legal visits, Hammond explained, but money also helps: A sunset Champagne tour on the High Line for one lucky bidder and ten friends was auctioned for $17,000 during last night’s cocktail hour. —Amy Odell
Related: The High Line: It Brings Good Things to Life [NYM]
developing
How to Succeed in Hudson Yards Without Really TryingDoes the developer who wants to tear down the High Line above 30th Street have an inside track on getting the Hudson Yards contract? Sources who ought to know tell us that the Durst Organization, which complained last week that preserving the High Line would cost $117 million, has hired the architecture firm of FXFowle to prepare its Hudson Yards bid. Coincidentally (we’re sure), FXFowle is the same firm that prepared the architectural protocol for the project on behalf of the MTA and the Hudson Yards Development Corp., a city-created overseer. The MTA claims it wants to keep the High Line, provided it understands the costs and revenues involved. But it will take quite a bid by another developer to dispel the notion that Durst has already seen the answer sheet. Alec Appelbaum
developing
No High Line in Redeveloped Hudson Yards? MTA Promises Public Will Have Last Word
At the Hudson Yards Development Corporation public meeting about redevelopment plans for the huge West Side rail yard the other night, Friends of the High Line boosters distributed American Apparel T-shirts with the logo “High Line Railyards,” a reminder that a good chunk of the now-beloved trestle runs through the site and implicitly urging the MTA to ensure that whoever develops there protects it. MTA chief planner Bill Wheeler dubbed himself a High Line fan, but he warned that developers’ bid prices would guide the MTA’s decision about protecting it. (In other words, if someone will pay more for the site but plan to remove the High Line, the MTA would be okay with that.) But here’s the good news for High Line supporters: The public-review process for the site means the MTA’s decision won’t be the last word.
developing
High Line Cars Should Stay on the Street, Community Board Says
Sometimes a parking space is just a parking space — even in the glitzy new High Line district. That’s what Chelsea’s Community Board 4 declared last night when it swatted down developer Young Woo & Associates plan for en suite parking at its 200 Eleventh Avenue development. Plans called for a car elevator that would have allowed residents to drive right to the door of the building’s fifteen floorthrough luxury condos — Madonna was said to be interested in buying one — but the Fire Department has made its disapproval known and last night the community board said the plan violated local zoning laws. (The board’s decision is only advisory, but the borough president, planning commission, and city council typically follow boards’ leads.) Under those rules, a new development can offer parking spots for only 20 percent of its units without a special permit. “The board has a principle that because of too many cars in the community board’s confines, they want to enforce the 20 percent,” district manager Robert Benfatto told us. So three spots, even hovering ones, would be just fine. — Alec Appelbaum
Related: The High Line: It Brings Good Things to Life [NYM]
Earlier: West Chelsea Car-Elevator Apartments: Going Down?
developing
A Lifeline for the Upper High Line?Last we checked in, it seemed that the officials were willing to let a successful bidder for the MTA’s Hudson Yards site tear down the part of the High Line that runs through it. But now it seems that the old rail trestle, slowly becoming a park, has a better chance of survival. Real Estate Board of New York president Steven Spinola, the developers’ rep in the bidding process for Yards site, tells us that the Hudson Yards Development Corporation showed a presentation yesterday that included a preference for cultural institutions, lots of open space, an attempt at affordable housing, and sympathy for the High Line. “They likely will say to developers: We would like to see the High Line continue, so explain what the ramifications would be of keeping it,” Spinola said. “I think they started off negative about the High Line and they’re now looking to keep it an open question.” Will developers — who must sink more than $300 million just to install a platform over the rail yards — willingly invest around an elevated park? “The High Line, if done properly, can clearly be an attractive amenity for the city,” Spinola says. “A few months ago people said, ‘Of course it’s a problem,’ and yesterday people said, ‘We’ll analyze it.’” —Alec Appelbaum
Earlier: The High Line, Suddenly Not as High?
photo op
You Love the High Line, You Got to Boogie
Taking a perhaps-illegal tour of the High Line this weekend, one of the bloggers at the Fagat Guide (get it? like Zagat?) found this lone rainbow-colored disco ball, noted an Anderson Cooper billboard in the background (at left), and deemed the park-to-be “the gayest thing since the Christopher Street piers.” Indeed.
With Diane Von Furstenberg Involved, You Already Knew This Thing Was Going to be Pretty Special [Fagat Guide via Curbed]
developing
City Names Trump Vet High Line Chief
The High Line’s supporters — from celeb friends like Edward Norton to City Hall backers like Dan Doctoroff — always say the elevated rail trestle will feel like a dream park. And now the city’s Parks Department has bestowed the dream job of managing the High Line on veteran park planner Michael Bradley. Bradley, 48, previously shepherded design and greenspace commitments at Riverside South, which Donald Trump built on the Upper West Side in the nineties. That job prepared him for the new gig indirectly: Bradley organized the $30,000 purchase of a dead locomotive that kids now play on in his old park.
The new gig, however, involves heavier challenges. Bradley’s job description includes surmounting engineering challenges (like installing “a waterproofing, drainage, and irrigation system,” according to the job description) and executing political pirouettes (like fund-raising and ensuring that developers whose buildings touch the High Line provide public access and lavatories and such). He’s also got a wardrobe to consider. “I’ve been thinking I need to get a windbreaker,” he says, disclosing that the Line’s logo will combine Parks’ maple leaf with Friends of the High Line’s stylized H. Then there’s working up “criteria for potential connections from adjacent properties” — which means deflating rumors that swanky condos on the Line will enjoy exclusive access. The Caledonia, at 16th Street and Tenth Avenue, is designing a publicly accessible stair and elevator to show how a luxury condo can touch the park without stiff-arming the public. How un-Donald is that? —Alec Appelbaum
cultural capital
The High Line, Suddenly Not as High?
Not that it’s any big surprise at this point — after secret sets of books, and floated-and-then-retracted fare hikes, and all that — but the MTA might be up to something a little shady again. While everyone’s busy being excited about the redevelopment of the High Line, it turns out the MTA has been whispering to developers looking at its West Side yards — where Bloomberg wanted to build a Jets stadium, and which contain 31 percent of the elevated rail tracks — that a purchaser might be able to dismantle at least part of the Line. (You know, so building could start faster.) Last night, Friends of the High Line rallied its base in a meeting at Chelsea Market to protest this news and presented the case that maintaining the High Line on the MTA property would actually make it more attractive to developers, and thus more lucrative to the MTA. To that end, Friends of the High Line — with partial funding from developers with projects elsewhere along the structure — offered this sketch, from the Chelsea firm SHoP Architects, of what a redeveloped MTA yard would look like with the High Line still intact up there. Pretty, ain’t it? —Alec Appelbaum
cultural capital
Tom Wolfe Wants a Bonfire at the Whitney
Tom Wolfe called the Landmarks Preservation Commission “de facto defunct” in a Times op-ed on Sunday, its members pawns of developer Aby Rosen and his evil plans to build a 30-story glass condo in the Upper East Side Historic District. Then today came news that the Whitney Museum, located in the same historic district and after decades of fighting to build an addition, would give up on its Madison Avenue expansion plan and instead build a “satellite” branch along the High Line in the meatpacking district. So does Wolfe think that this move, finally, is the right stuff? We called to find out.
So, Tom, happy that the expansion has been stopped?
Everything possible should be done to keep the Whitney from expanding. I mean, we really don’t need any more of that, unless they improve in taste. Mainly, they should just get rid of the building. Almost anything they could put in its place, as long as it’s no higher than that, would be real plus for the city.
the morning line
The Inexplicables
• Mayor Bloomberg seems to be making all the right moves in the wake of the 50-bullet NYPD hailstorm that killed an unarmed man in Queens. The mayor called the shooting “unacceptable or inexplicable” during a meeting with the city’s black leaders (including Al Sharpton and Charlie Rangel) — unusually strong language considering that all the facts aren’t officially in yet. [NYT]
• Firefighters doused a fire in the basement of a Bed-Stuy apartment only to find a man’s body duct-taped to a bed. It’s unclear whether the flame killed the victim or was intended to hide the crime. [WNBC]
• Even the most radical proponents of graffiti-as-legit-art would have a hard time defending one Patrick McCormick, whose fifteen arrests alternate between graffiti offenses (his artless tag, seen all over town, is “MAP”) and things like robberies and the murder of homeless people. He is now back behind bars after pleading guilty to a relatively mild crime of smashing a subway window with a hammer. What a guy. [NYDN]
• In Trenton, the heirs of a wealthy couple that donated $35 million to Princeton in 1961 want the money back. Their reasoning hinges on a claim, which they’re taking to court, that the university is misusing the endowment. It’s safe to say there goes that honorary degree. [NYP]
• And the Whitney is jumping on the High Line: The museum has inked a tentative deal with the city to build a downtown expansion that will also function as the entrance to the trippy park. This appears to mean that all talk of expanding its uptown space is now officially over, and the meatpacking district has ornery UES landmarks boards to thank. [amNY]
