The cooperative apartment building at 233 East 69th Street filed a lawsuit last week against the Metropolitan Transportation Authority charging that it had unlawfully changed the design of the ventilating structures it plans for the Second Avenue Subway.
The MTA plans to build eight such structures along a 34-block stretch of Second Avenue in the first phase of the long-planned subway.
The lawsuit argues that the Final Environmental Impact Statement for the subway, which was approved in 2004, said that these structures "would typically be approximately the same size as a typical row house - 25 feet wide, 75 feet deep, and four- to five-stories high, although some may be wider."
A presentation by the MTA to a meeting last November of Community Board 8, however, indicated that the design concepts for the structures had changed and that they now are somewhat larger and more industrial-looking.
An article by Sarah Ryley yesterday at therealdeal.com noted that "sidewalk grates now violate the city's building code" and that the structures in question "are needed to house the subway's state-of-the-art ventilation and smoke evacuation systems" according to Keven Ortiz, a MTA spokesperson.
Residents of the apartment building received a letter from the authority January 13 in which it declined to modify its plans for the utility structure, the article said. It quoted Michael D. Zarin, an attorney for the residents, as stating that the authority must now conduct a new environmental review.
The MTA plans to build eight such structures along a 34-block stretch of Second Avenue in the first phase of the long-planned subway.
The lawsuit argues that the Final Environmental Impact Statement for the subway, which was approved in 2004, said that these structures "would typically be approximately the same size as a typical row house - 25 feet wide, 75 feet deep, and four- to five-stories high, although some may be wider."
A presentation by the MTA to a meeting last November of Community Board 8, however, indicated that the design concepts for the structures had changed and that they now are somewhat larger and more industrial-looking.
An article by Sarah Ryley yesterday at therealdeal.com noted that "sidewalk grates now violate the city's building code" and that the structures in question "are needed to house the subway's state-of-the-art ventilation and smoke evacuation systems" according to Keven Ortiz, a MTA spokesperson.
Residents of the apartment building received a letter from the authority January 13 in which it declined to modify its plans for the utility structure, the article said. It quoted Michael D. Zarin, an attorney for the residents, as stating that the authority must now conduct a new environmental review.
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Architecture Critic
Carter Horsley
Since 1997, Carter B. Horsley has been the editorial director of CityRealty. He began his journalistic career at The New York Times in 1961 where he spent 26 years as a reporter specializing in real estate & architectural news. In 1987, he became the architecture critic and real estate editor of The New York Post.
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