Commercial Observer | The New York Observer

Anywhere but Downtown!

Tue, 26 Jan 2010 19:51:15 -0500

In his nearly 24 years as president of the powerful Real Estate Board of New York, Steven Spinola has rarely seen his members so riled up. "They're saying to me, 'You've got to stop this, you can't let it happen.'"

The commotion: the Obama administration's plan to hold its 9/11 terror trial in the federal courthouse in Lower Manhattan.

Pleading with any and every elected and government official with potential influence on...

REBNY’s Independence Party Funds

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 13:37:20 -0500

The $700,000 or so in funds the Real Estate Board of New York raised to win elections with the Independence Party are now public, displaying the names behind the real estate industry's nascent push to bring a stronger business voice in state politics and counter the Working Families Party.

The money last fall went to a set of individual Council campaigns, in which the party funded mailers and field operations to push voters to...

Speyers Throw In the Towel, Hand Stuy Town to Lenders

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 10:03:57 -0500

More than three years after it began, real estate giant Tishman Speyer's ambitious and high-priced quest to control a chunk of the East Side of Manhattan has come to a close.

Early Monday morning, Tishman Speyer and partner BlackRock issued a statement saying they intend to transfer control of the 11,200-unit Stuyvesant Town/Peter Cooper Village to their creditors. (The decision was first reported late last night by the Wall Street Journal.)

And so ends the bumpy...

Swig Shutters Helmsley Spear Brokerage

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 16:23:55 -0500

Kent Swig is shutting down the Helmsley Spear brokerage, according to a broker who attended a Friday meeting at about 3 p.m., at which the announcement was made.

Steven Kerschenbaum, executive vice president of Swig Equities, Mr. Swig's property investment and management firm, made the announcement, while Mr. Swig toyed with his PDA, according to our source.

"What really bothers me, really bothers me, is that the women here, the support staff, haven't gotten paid in three weeks, and won't know when they...

REBNY's Big Apple Circus and the Mystery of the Cash Bar

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 13:53:46 -0500

Real Estate Board of New York President Steven Spinola escorted Governor David Paterson through the cocktail reception before REBNY's 114th annual banquet on Thursday evening at the Midtown Hilton. "This is Sandy Lindenbaum," Mr. Spinola said, introducing the governor to the legendary real estate lawyer (interviewed in November by The Commercial Observer). "He's one of our honorees tonight."

"Oh, congratulations," the governor said. Mr. Lindenbaum nodded and was on his way as were...

Sander, Former M.T.A. Chief, to Chair Regional Plan Association

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 11:24:39 -0500

Lee Sander is back in the advocacy world.

Executive director of the M.T.A. between 2007 and mid-2009, Mr. Sander Thursday was elected chairman of the Regional Plan Association, the prominent advocacy organization that pushes for greater transit investment and rational urban planning.

Mr. Sander, pushed from his M.T.A. job amid a restructuring by Governor Paterson, with whom he never had a close relationship (Governor Spitzer appointed Mr. Sander), used to work closely with...

Whither the Ugly Sidewalk Shed, Slayer of Urban Vitality?

Thu, 21 Jan 2010 17:39:04 -0500

One of the more pernicious byproducts of building renovations in this city may be getting less noxious.

Sidewalk sheds—the ugly one-story scaffolds that line every mid-sized or tall building in the city at one time or another during renovation, inspection and construction—can now take another form. The Bloomberg administration announced Thursday the winner of its sidewalk shed design competition, with the winner being Young-Hwan Choi, a first-year architecture student at Penn who designed...

‘Under Fire’ Tishman Speyer Taps ABNY’s Adams

Wed, 20 Jan 2010 16:13:40 -0500

Real estate giant Tishman Speyer is hiring fresh help for its public image.

The firm announced Wednesday that Michelle Adams, the well-connected executive director of the Association for a Better New York and an aide to ABNY chairman and landlord Bill Rudin, would be its new managing director for public affairs.

The hire comes as the firm and its young co-CEO, Rob Speyer, are in the public hot seat for a series...

New York Life Signs Mega-Renewal, Second Biggest Lease of Past Year

Wed, 20 Jan 2010 14:54:51 -0500

In one of the largest transactions of the past year, New York Life has signed a long-term renewal for its 415,000-square-foot offices at 63 Madison Avenue.

It may just be a plain vanilla renewal, but in a tepid market, this was the second largest lease of 2009, on the heels of Paul Weiss’s 550,000-square-foot renewal at 1285 Sixth Avenue. The mutual life insurance company – the country’s largest – had been scouting the market...

King Neil of Greenwich Village

Tue, 19 Jan 2010 22:15:10 -0500

Neil Bender, Greenwich Village's largest private landlord, caretaker of and disputed heir to the William Gottlieb real estate empire-which includes more than 100 individual properties in what has become one of the most valuable residential neighborhoods in New York City-is a reclusive, 54-year-old Springsteen fan with a thick shock of silver hair that he's wont to run his fingers through, a limp handshake, a stocky build, an affection for old cars, and...

The West Side Rail Yards—It’s Alive!

Tue, 19 Jan 2010 12:13:51 -0500

The Related Companies, the real estate giant that built the Time Warner Center, is nearing an agreement to commit to building over the West Side rail yards, an oft-delayed project that could be Manhattan's single biggest development.

The firm envisions $15 billion of new office, hotel and apartment towers on a 26-acre site near the Javits Center.

Related, led by billionaire Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross, was conditionally designated to develop the...

Google Gobbles 57K More Feet in Taconic’s 111 Eighth

Mon, 18 Jan 2010 16:18:08 -0500

111 Eighth Avenue

The amount of silicon in Manhattan just got bigger. Since Google first occupied the old Port Authority building at 111 Eighth Avenue back in 2006, New York has been rife with speculation about the day-to-day exploits of the Internet empire. What's it like to work there? Is it true there's a slide? Is it a cult? Are they building a parallel Internet? Will dark matter one day be used...

State Loses Big Environmental Appeal Over Solow's ConEd Site

Thu, 17 Dec 2009 14:24:40 -0500

The Paterson administration was handed a potentially costly loss at the hands of a state appellate court Thursday, as the state Department of Environmental Conservation was denied in its attempt to appeal a brownfield cleanup case against enigmatic developer Sheldon Solow.

The state now stands to pay a previously estimated $250 million to Mr. Solow as a result of the opinion, which upheld an earlier decision that ruled the state had to award...

Dubai’s Man in Manhattan

Tue, 15 Dec 2009 19:29:28 -0500

Even those who don’t adore Andrew Farkas give the guy his due: The New York whiz kid who conquered New York real estate before becoming Dubai World’s man in Manhattan is one sharp suit.

Consider this. In early 2009, well before Dubai World’s announcement that it would postpone servicing $26 billion in debt shook global markets, Mr. Farkas, unbeknownst to all but his closest friends and business associates, cashed out of substantial investments with...

Wage Wars: $10 an Hour Emerges as Make-or-Break for New Development

Tue, 15 Dec 2009 18:28:55 -0500

By all measures, a press conference early Monday afternoon on the steps of City Hall appeared to be a victory celebration.

The City Council had just voted, 45-1, to block a planned new mall at the Bronx’s Kingsbridge Armory, as the developer, the Related Companies, balked at requiring its retail tenants to pay wages of at least $10 an hour—$11.50 without benefits—a so-called living wage. And while the elected officials on hand gave a...