Real Estate

Tenant advocates claim they have begun to see a pattern of "predatory equity" and harassment of rent-stabilized apartment dwellers. [NY Times]

For the time being Cipriani's won't be serving Bellinis until the family resolves a dispute with the State Liquor License Authority. [NY Times]

Business owners in Willets Point charge the city with neglecting to provide basic services like sewers and snow plowing in an effort to devalue their properties and ease the path to redevelopment. [NY Times]

US retail performance was mixed in April, with discounters up more than expected. [NY Times]

West Hampton residents are up in arms over a local synagogue's plan to erect a symbolic plastic boundary. [NY Post]

A new school is coming to Chelsea. [NY Post]

The city is planning a crackdown on limos and livery cabs that illegally pick up fares. [NY Post]

Governor John Corzine wants New Jersey to be first state in the US North East to build an electricity generating wind farm off the coast of the Atlantic. [Bloomberg]

Flower retailers get a boost from Mother's Day. [NYDN]

The Brooklyn Borough President refuses to accept Mayor Bloomberg's plan to move the city's main intake center for homeless men from the East Side of Manhattan to Crown Heights. [NYDN]

Rudin Management is building a new public school in the East Village. [NY Sun]

The deal for billions of dollars worth of development over the West Side rail yards collapsed Thursday afternoon, with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and Tishman Speyer hitting an impasse in negotiations. The failure to reach a deal came more than five weeks after the M.T.A. announced Tishman Speyer as the winner of the development rights, after a months-long bidding contest between six of the city’s largest development firms.

According to a statement from the M.T.A., the failure to complete the deal came as Tishman Speyer refused to close on the agreement for the eastern half of the rail yards until the western half was rezoned, a process that could easily take until late 2009, if not 2010. The accord reached in late March held that Tishman would close on the eastern half; then, after the western half was rezoned, they would close the deal on that section, completing the deal. The total deal was estimated to bring the M.T.A. about $1 billion from Tishman.

The collapse in talks came one day after the M.T.A. passed a self-imposed seven-day deadline to finish negotiations and sign a conditional letter of designation, a document that was not signed when Tishman won the bidding. Officials said at the time of that announcement, in late March, that they were highly confident a final deal would be reached, characterizing the designation letter as something of a formality.  read more »

Let's hope the Christian Right doesn't drink a lot of coffee, otherwise Starbucks is in for agita. [Gawker]

The annual Dumbo designers showcase kicks off this weekend. [Dumbo NYC]

Hundreds of security guards marched on Midtown this afternoon to demand better benefits in a new contract being negotiated. [Crain's]

15 Central Park West has its third $20 million-plus condo sale in a week. [TRD]

Producer Norman Lear also closed on a 38th-floor condo in the building. [TRD]

A new Stuy Town marketing Web site is trying to lure young professionals to the mainly senior, mostly rent-stabilized complex with bright colors and shiny things. [Curbed]

A squirrel scourge in Astoria is pitting animal activists against co-op dwellers who want to cull the bushy-tailed rodents. [Gothamist]

The new Port Authority chief disses Frank Gehry's design for Atlantic Yards. [Daily Intelligencer]

From a new report (PDF) by the Center for Economic and Policy Research and the National Low Income Housing Coalition:

According to the most recent Census numbers, in the past year, the number of renter households in the United States increased by nearly 1 million. By contrast, the number of homeowner households increased by just 139,000. The ability for metropolitan area housing markets to accommodate this shift to rental will vary considerably.

The report also predicts negative equity for New York City area homeowners in the coming years. That means homes would re-sell for less than what sellers paid for them. From a summary of the report:

... [B]y the year 2012, homeowners in New York will have $106,000 of negative equity and in Los Angeles, the shortfall would be $228,000.

My colleague Dana Rubinstein broke the news earlier this week that the new One Bryant Park unofficially opened on Monday. Over 300 Bank of America employees took to their desks in the 54-story, Durst-developed skyscraper in midtown.

Above is a photo of the lobby earlier today. Life! At last!

Renowned architect Richard Rogers has left the architectural team to renovate and expand the Javits Center, a move that comes four months after the state finalized a decision against any large scale expansion, an Empire State Development Corporation spokesman confirmed.

The Pritzker Prize-winning Mr. Rogers was brought on for the project by Pataki development chief Charles Gargano in part as a means to draw public support for the project. Mr. Rogers designed, among other projects, Paris’ Centre Pompidou museum with Renzo Piano.  read more »

Who says rock 'n' roll clubs can't survive in today's bloated retail market?

Not John "JE" Englebert, owner of Suzy Wong and Prime, who's decided to flout common wisdom and open his own rock club, dubbed Devils Playground, in Chelsea with girlfriend Lisa Pittleman, a granddaughter of residential developer Leonard Litwin.  read more »

Five weeks after Tishman Speyer was announced the winner of the West Side rail yards, negotiations are still unfinished between Tishman, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the city, an M.T.A. spokesman confirmed.

The parties yesterday missed a seven-day deadline set by the M.T.A. at its board meeting last week, with the final details of a conditional letter of designation yet to be finalized. That came after the parties missed a self-imposed deadline of two weeks from the initial announcement.

At the board meeting last week, the M.T.A. said Tishman put an initial signing fee of $11 million into escrow as the parties neared an agreement, though issues over infrastructure costs remained unsolved.

Los Angeles' residential forceclosure rate in April was 13 times that of New York's, according to a new report from PropertyShark (PDF).

Los Angeles recorded 4,540 newly scheduled foreclosure auctions in April, up an astounding 466.8 percent from the number in April 2007. New York City recorded 329 foreclosure auctions in April, up 84.8 percent from April 2007, but down from March of this year. New York's foreclosure rate per household in April was 0.011 percent. L.A.'s was 0.145 percent.  read more »