Noho's hidden Great Jones Alley is at the center of a $10M lawsuit

A $10 million legal battle is raging over Great Jones Alley, which the New York Post characterizes as a “tiny, 20-foot wide, 137-foot long sliver of pavement between Bond and West 3rd streets.” In other words, it’s an alley.

Unless it isn’t just an alley. According to Madison Realty Capital, the firm behind the ultra-luxe condos at 1 Great Jones Alley, this so-called alley is in fact a secret, gated entrance to the “private paradise” that is the ground-up condo building, designed to protect the building’s future rich and famous residents from paps and commoners.

Billed as one of the luxury building’s many amenities, renderings of the made-over alley show a prominent gate protecting a charming little cobblestone street with a fancy car (presumably driven by or for a famous person, not shown.)

1 Great Jones Alley

But here is the problem: 1 Great Jones Alley only owns part of the alley. The other part belongs to 684 Broadway, a nice (if somewhat less expensive) 22-unit co-op building with floor-to-ceiling windows. And according to them, 1 Great Jones Alley has it all wrong. The alley is not a luxury private entrance, but rather, an regular old alley — and they want to keep it that way.

Last week, the co-op board of 684 Broadway filed a $10 million lawsuit against 1 Great Jones Alley to “protect its interests in the alley,” the New York Post reports.

They argue that Madison Realty is “not authorized to remove and/or alter the gate that sits at the entrance to the alley … [and] do not have the right to advertise the alley as ‘private’ to potential buyers,” according to court papers.

And that idling car? That’s a fantasy, too, because, they say, cars are not allowed to idle in alley without their consent. The co-op board wants the “misleading” ads to stop, and for 1 Great Jones to inform its residents that “no cars, or changes, will be permitted” on the strip. So much for the cobblestone paparazzi-protection.

“The board believes that part of the alley and gate belongs to 684 Broadway, and felt that they had to file this lawsuit to protect their property rights,” 684 Broadway told the Post in a statement via its lawyer, Robert Brown. Madison Realty did not respond to the paper’s request for comment.

• 20-foot alley sparks $10 million real estate battle [New York Post]
• 1 Great Jones Alley [Official]