Although the winter months have historically lowered things like mood, libido, energy and rents, at least one of these has proved impervious to the winter gloom this year. Manhattan rents have actually increased this season, bucking a time old seasonal trend. Read More
Last week, The Observer learned with the help of Rutgers economics professor Jason Barr that the reason for the development of Midtown apart from Lower Manhattan, and the skyscrapers both possess, had nothing to do with bedrock beneath these towers, as had long been believed. Call it the uncanny valley, the soaring mountain range that makes the New York City skyline the best in the world.
Having determined what was not the cause of this unique skyline, The Observer thought we had figured out what was, that being the flight of the wealthy north. But it turns out one very influential urban investigator begged to differ: New Yorker architecture critic and Pullitzer Prize winner Paul Goldberger. Read More
Buzzfeed shot this pretty cool video of a bike ride the entire length of Broadway. The 13-mile ride elapses in only five minutes, but it shows a huge swath of architectural and economic diversity. Read More
In last week’s column, we looked at the third-quarter 2011 investment sales market on a citywide basis and noted that the dollar volume of sales dropped from $8.68 billion in the second quarter to $6.5 billion, a 25 percent decline. This would appear to indicate that the investment sales market is slowing. However, a closer look tells a different story.
If we discount the second-quarter total, the $6.5 billion volume observed this time around was the highest since the third quarter of 2008.
In fact, the number of properties sold citywide reached 548, up 8.5 percent from the 505 sales reported in the past quarter. That number marked the highest quarterly total since the fourth quarter of 2008.
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Things sure are moving fast on the East Side waterfront. Then again, who can blame the U.N. and its neighbors for being over-eager, as they have waited well over a decade for a land deal to build a new tower and riverfront esplanade. Two weeks ago, Fumihiko Maki got back to work on his designs for a new U.N. tower, and now a coalition of civic groups have announced the winners of an competition to create a new waterfront park stretching from 39th to 60th streets.
Given that the waterfront has languished for so long, the designers proposed some terribly lively schemes.
Held by Transportation Alternatives and d3, an art and design organization, Closing the Gap sought proposals “that fundamentally transform how people move through Manhattan,” as the competition brief put it. While that might be an ambitious way of thinking about the greenway, it is true this will close the 22-mile loop surrounding Manhattan island. Coincidentally, dozens of firms from 22 different countries responded to the competition. Read More
Just a few days ago, it seemed as though Governor Cuomo and Mayor Bloomberg might be headed for a first-class political row. The mayor was pushing for state approval of a plan to allow livery cabs to pick up street hails in the four outer boroughs plus Manhattan north of Central Park. But the governor was sending signals that he might not sign such a measure, saying that support for the plan was “dissipating.”
Fortunately, the mayor and governor now appear to be on the same page. Read More
Talk about a bad trip! In Le Freak: An Upside Down Story of Family, Disco, and Destiny, the new memoir from Nile Rodgers out this October, there's a acid-addled anecdote involving a certain downtown art superstar, a story that's perhaps never seen the light of day. It involves a party in Little Italy gone Read More
While The Observer believes Portland has taken over Brooklyn, inveterate blogger Jeremiah Moss sees a creeping Brooklynization going on in Manhattan that is ruining both boroughs. Read More
Long Island couple Christine Tulley and Rachel Baker traveled to downtown Manhattan at dawn on Sunday morning for reasons more sentimental than practical. Ms. Baker, a TriBeCa native, and Ms. Tulley showed up at the courthouse to be married on July 24, 2011, the first day New York State's Marriage Equality Law went into effect. Read More
It is one of the most mythic and elusive redevelopment projects in the city, the plan to restore at least some of Penn Station's former glory with a new station inside the old Farley Post Office. But this train could be delayed for good. Read More
It is called yardwork. Read More
The latest in our series on the neighborhoods of New York City. Previously, Hell's Foyer. A model who lives in Tribeca scoffed when we asked what he thought about Venice, Manhattan. “Venice? I don’t think so,” said Anderson Ribeiro, 31. “It’s so dirty, and there are all kinds of people selling a slew Read More
On a sun-kissed Thursday afternoon, Gerard Kiley arrived at Grubb & Ellis' new Manhattan headquarters. It was the broker's first visit to the Avenue of the Americas office, but it certainly wouldn't be his last.
Indeed, for a broker who focuses squarely on Westchester and Fairfield counties, the 25-year commercial real estate pro's thrice-weekly, 45-minute Read More
"I see people who buy $25 mac-and-cheese on both sides of this argument," Paul Steely White, executive director of Transportation Alternatives, told The Observer last week as he finished dinner at Rachel's Burritos in Park Slope and prepared to hop on his bike for the 1-mile trek home. "And yet I do think it's true. Read More
