The news yesterday regarding the Upper West Side's historic West-Park Presbyterian Church got us wondering what's up with the city's other big act of holy war, the drab 26-story NYU dorm shooting out of a preserved sliver of the East Village's St. Ann's. Turns out, a lot! The scaffolding has come down from around the old church's leftover not-so-pearly gates at Fourth Avenue and 12th Street, forcing a confession out of the controversial project's developer, Hudson Companies.
Whereas up to now it had been assumed that the church's narthex was left behind to be incorporated into some sort of grand entrance for the little purple people, the truth is a different matter: The old church bits aren't connected to the dorm at all. Instead, the tower has its own cement access path, and St. Ann's is floating out in some sort of purgatory, with the immediate area behind the church's door (permanently?) gated off. We've had a lot to say about this project over the years, but still: Is this the building boom's worst?
· St. Ann's coverage [Curbed]
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