Good morning, and welcome to New York Minute, a roundup of the New York City news you need to know about today. Send stories you think should be included to tips@curbed.com.
Co-op at ultra-exclusive UES building in contract for $50 million
Billionaire financier J. Christopher Flowers is in contract to buy an apartment in a luxury Upper East Side co-op building for roughly $50 million, The Wall Street Journal reports. The sale, if it closes for that price, would be one of the city’s priciest real estate transactions of the new year.
The unit in question spans roughly 7,500 square feet—an entire floor of the 1920s building—on Fifth Avenue and East 66th Street, but because the apartment was not officially on the market, there are few other available details, according to The Journal. Other units in the building are known to have 36-foot long living rooms, soaring ceilings, and libraries facing Central Park.
The exclusive co-op building only has about 18 apartments, which have been home to high-profile residents such as the late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and the late chairman of Bear Stearns Alan C. Greenberg.
And in other news...
- The de Blasio administration has officially shelved plans to rezone the Bronx’s Southern Boulevard area after the idea was all but rejected by local officials and community groups.
- The former P.S. 64 school building, a crumbling East Village landmark whose owner has been in a 20 year feud with the city over developing the property, won’t be subject to the city’s new crackdown on deteriorating buildings.
- The death of a carriage horse in Central Park has reignited animal rights advocates calls for a ban on the popular tourist trade.
- A federal standoff over financing an $11 billion project to build new tunnels under the Hudson River has pushed officials to consider repairs to the existing century-old tunnels—and they want to take a page out of Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s book with his last-minute changes to work on the L train’s Canarsie Tunnel.
- A new measure to safeguard non-profits against certain tax liens has passed the City Council.
- The New York City Commission on Property Tax Reform will host a hearing on an overhaul to the system—the announcement comes just after a lawsuit challenging the current system was dismissed.
- MTA officials plan to spend $18 million to widen a roadway on the Brooklyn side of the Verrazzano Bridge.
- On the topic of bridges, a new lawsuit claims the recently opened Kosciuszko Bridge is susceptible to terrorism.
- Following a spike of pedestrian deaths in New York City, state lawmakers want to make it easier to criminally charge reckless drivers with a new package of legislation.
- 200 Amsterdam made headlines in February with a stunning court ruling that developers must chop as many as 20 floors from the building to comply with the area’s zoning, but how did we get to this point? Here’s a detailed history of how 200 Amsterdam came to be.
- Nearly a dozen new gardens have transformed Brooklyn Heights’ old Jehovah’s Witnesses headquarters into a green retreat.
- And finally, Downtown Brooklyn’s landmarked Gage & Tollner restaurant—which just went through a “magical” restoration—will reopen on March 15.
The new Gage & Tollner restaurant is gorgeous! It officially opens on the Ides of March! pic.twitter.com/SHY70S2BrP
— Bill Roundy (@bartoonist) March 1, 2020
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