(Photo: Lisa Corson)

As the Cooper Square Hotel on the Bowery gets its coating of glass, and as its backers spend $11 million to buy three adjacent lots, its East 5th Street neighbors are afraid it’s taking over the block. The hotel will have three indoor bars, a garden, a dining patio, and—what most troubles residents—a terrace off its second floor that will end about 30 inches from apartment windows. “Someone can just reach over and climb in to someone’s bedroom window,” says Stuart Zamsky of the block association. Community Board 3 is under pressure to withhold a liquor-license endorsement until the swanky hotel reaches an agreement with its neighbors. “The block association gave us a list of their concerns,” says developer Matthew Moss of the Peck Moss Group. “We agreed right off the bat to half of them or so, but some of the things they were asking for were a little difficult for us to agree to,” and those are items that are still being discussed, with a November 17 deadline looming. One catch: Moss has agreed to install soundproof windows and air conditioners in nearby apartments, so residents won’t be kept up by revelers, but tenants say landlord Martin Baumrind won’t allow the installations to proceed. Why not? “I never speak to the press because they never say anything nice about landlords,” Baumrind says.

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Related:

• Archive: “Intelligencer”
• Table of Contents: Nov 5, 2007 issue of New York | Subscribe!