The land use and park committees of Community Board 7 were given a presentation last night by Kate Wood, shown at the left, of "Central Park West Skyline Potential Futures," a study it commissioned from Weisz & Yoes Architecture.

Although the 62nd to 96th Street section of the famous street overlooking the western boundary of Central Park from 59th to 110th Streets is part of the Upper West Side/Central Park West Historic District created in 1990, its famous Art Deco skyline is not protected, Ms. Wood declared, as "existing regulations create development opportunities, especially over low-rise sites, that could tip the balance and transform this quintessential part of New York."

The study identified 10 "soft sites" that "if developed as aggressively as possible with residential towers have the potential to transform the existing skyline into something completely new."

The ten sites are the Society for Ethical Culture at 33 Central Park West, 9 West 64th Street, Holy Trinity Lutheran Church at 51 Central Park West, the Second Church of Christ Science at 77 Central Park West, Congregation Shearith Israel at 99 Central Park West, the Fourth Universalist Society at 160 Central Park West, the New York Historical society at 170 Central Park West, the Trevor Day School at 15 West 88th Street, 249 Central Park West and the Crenshaw Christian Center at 361 Central Park West.

The study did not consider sites with cooperative or condominium apartments or with 10 or more rent stabilized units on the assumption "that these are unlikely development sites because the owners of the former would be unlikely to agree to major redevelopment and the latter's leases would be too difficult to terminate."

"Now is the time to establish a long-range vision for the future of Central Park West," the study maintained, whose "distinctive, undulating high-rise/low-rise silhouette defines New York City as resonantly as the Chrysler Building, Grand Central Station or the Statue of Liberty."

"By comparing development that could take place under the existing zoning with development that is possible under special permit and variance scenarios," the study said, "Landmark West! will be prepared to more pro-actively protect the architecture and urbanism of Central Park West, using preservation and planning strategies that may include landmark guidelines, appropriate rezonings or the establishing of a 'development rights conservancy' (taking inspiration from models set by open space preservation organizations)...."

The report suggests that the city consider "landmarks guidelines," changes in zoning such as the elimination of Section 74-711 special permits for landmarks within historic districts, institutional landmark conservancy that would create a land trust to preserve the light and air over buildings or literally buy, or "retire," the development r"ghts, and architectural guidelines. "Central Park's other Skylines all need similar attention to determine how development might change them; the northern edge of the park...will almost certainly see a tremendous transformation in the next few decades."

Ms. Wood said the study was still a "draft" and that her organization hoped to get comments from the public on it within the next few weeks.

The committee spent a lot of time discussing whether guidelines should look beyond "silhouettes" to a project's "materiality." Page Cowley, co-chair of the land use committee, noted with approval that the Department of Buildings recently announced it would require builders to post drawings of any proposed exterior changes to a building and that the public would have a 30-day period in which to challenge the granting of a permit for the project, but she suggested that the period for public comment might be too short.