See long-abandoned Greenpoint Hospital’s future as affordable housing

The long-delayed redevelopment of Greenpoint Hospital into affordable housing is finally moving forward. On Thursday, the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development announced that it had selected a development team comprised of the Hudson Companies, St. Nicks Alliance, and Project Renewal, to transform the multi-building site at 288 Jackson Street into affordable housing and a new homeless shelter.

Magnusson Architecture and Planning, along with Architecture Outfit have been tapped to design the new complex, which will bring 512 new affordable apartments to the neighborhood. The apartments will be spread out between four buildings on the campus, and will be built in two phases.

The first phase will concern construction on part of the Greenpoint Hospital campus located south of Skillman Avenue. In this phase, the existing 200-bed shelter at the site, will be relocated into a rehabilitated building on the southern end of the campus. This phase will also see construction on a new building with 267 apartments.

MAP and Architecture Outfit

The second phase will concern the main hospital building, which is being converted into a 109-unit senior home. The existing boiler building will be demolished to make way for a 136-unit residential building. The apartments will be open to extremely-low, very-low and low-income households, and 30 percent of the total apartments will be set aside for the formerly homeless.

In addition to the apartments and homeless shelter, the complex will also be home to 21,500 square feet of community facilities, which includes a cafe, a workforce development center, and a residents lounge/community center.

Greenpoint Hospital opened as six buildings in 1915 to serve those who might have been injured in the nearby factories and warehouses. In the 1930s, two more buildings were added to the site. By the 1980s, the site had fallen into disrepair, and the hospital was shuttered in 1982. In the intervening years, one of the buildings was converted into the existing shelter which is known as the Barbara S. Kleinman Residence; four buildings were converted into affordable housing in the 1990s; and yet another building became the Greenpoint Renaissance Center in the 2000s.

The rest of the campus however has been languishing for many years, and local elected officials and residents have repeated called on the city to redevelop the abandoned buildings. In the summer of 2017, there were reports of squatters having taken over parts of the abandoned main hospital building. But shortly after that, the city put out a Request for Expressions of Interest (RFEI), and this development team was chosen from the response to that. The city expects that construction will get underway in 2021.

MAP and Architecture Outfit

• De Blasio revives Greenpoint Hospital’s conversion into affordable housing [Curbed]
• Long-stalled Greenpoint Hospital building taken over by squatters, say neighbors [Curbed]