A study prepared for the Pier 40 Partnership by HR&A Advisors maintains that the pier needs $280 million to renovate its interior spaces and parking spaces and roof and piles, according to an article in this week's edition of The Villager.
The Pier 40 Partnership submitted an "alternative" proposal earlier this month to the Hudson River Park Trust that is currently considering two proposals to redevelop the large pier at West Houston Street in Greenwich Village.
One of the proposals is a $626 million plan by Pier 40 Performing Arts Center, a project of the Related Companies, that Jeff Blau, president of Related, said would add facilities for the Cirque du Soleil and the TriBeCa Film Festival, a 1,800-seat music hall, a 28,650-square-foot event space, shops and restaurants, parking spaces, a marina and playing fields.
The other proposal, known as the People's Pier, by Urban Cove and CampGroup Inc., would build a high school, three swimming pools and additional space for parks and athletic fields at an estimated cost of about $145 million. Urban Cove is a non-profit organization that serves 800 at-risk youths each year and its Net Gain program provides 17 public high schools in the city that lack gym facilities with free gym space for their after-school programs. CampGroup LLC runs 14 camps in the Northeast and Midwest serving about 5,000 children each summer. The People's Pier proposal has a construction budget of about $160 million including $31 million for infrastructure, pile and substructure work and it requires no public subsidies.
The Pier 40 Partnership plan calls the creation of a non-profit conservancy for the pier that would pay the trust an annual rent of $5 million. The plan would visually open the pier along West Street, widen a walkway around the pier, create a "Green Room" at its southwest corner for events that would contribute about $2 million annually, increase the number of parking spaces on the pier from 2,150 to 2,800. The parking would provide the conservancy with about $13 million annually.
In addition, the conservancy plan calls for the creation of a 100,000-square-foot educational component to generate another $4 million annually, and a 238,000-square-foot Visual Arts Market with an assumed annual revenue for the conservancy of $4.7 million.
According to a very long article by Lincoln Anderson in The Villager, "the pier's annual total revenues from tenants would be $24 million" and "after expenses, $15 million would be left, which would cove the annual $5 million rent payment to the Trust, plus the rate of return on the I.D.A. tax-exempt bonds" the conservancy would issue to pay for fixing up the facility.
Mr. Anderson's article also quoted Connie Fishman, the president of the Hudson River Park Trust, as saying it will evaluate the Pier 40 Partnership report "thoroughly, along with the two development proposals currently under consideration, in the weeks ahead."
Recently, the article continued, "Tobi Bergman, president of the Pier Park & Playground Association, which runs youth sports programs on the pier, had expressed some initial support" for a proposal to park city garbage trucks on the pier for additional revenue, "but has since drawn away from it."
The Hudson River Park Trust maintains it must develop the pier to create revenue for the upkeep of the five-mile park, which was chartered in 1998 and is still under construction.
The Hudson River Park Act disallowed hotels, residential uses, manufacturing, warehousing, office uses not related to permitted park uses and gambling vessels on the site that was built in 1954 for the Holland America Line as a commercial shipping terminal. The pier subsequently was used for storage, offices and a bus depot before it was converted to a public parking garage and a soccer field was built atop the two-story pier building in 1999, and other sports fields and park space have since been added.
The Pier 40 Partnership submitted an "alternative" proposal earlier this month to the Hudson River Park Trust that is currently considering two proposals to redevelop the large pier at West Houston Street in Greenwich Village.
One of the proposals is a $626 million plan by Pier 40 Performing Arts Center, a project of the Related Companies, that Jeff Blau, president of Related, said would add facilities for the Cirque du Soleil and the TriBeCa Film Festival, a 1,800-seat music hall, a 28,650-square-foot event space, shops and restaurants, parking spaces, a marina and playing fields.
The other proposal, known as the People's Pier, by Urban Cove and CampGroup Inc., would build a high school, three swimming pools and additional space for parks and athletic fields at an estimated cost of about $145 million. Urban Cove is a non-profit organization that serves 800 at-risk youths each year and its Net Gain program provides 17 public high schools in the city that lack gym facilities with free gym space for their after-school programs. CampGroup LLC runs 14 camps in the Northeast and Midwest serving about 5,000 children each summer. The People's Pier proposal has a construction budget of about $160 million including $31 million for infrastructure, pile and substructure work and it requires no public subsidies.
The Pier 40 Partnership plan calls the creation of a non-profit conservancy for the pier that would pay the trust an annual rent of $5 million. The plan would visually open the pier along West Street, widen a walkway around the pier, create a "Green Room" at its southwest corner for events that would contribute about $2 million annually, increase the number of parking spaces on the pier from 2,150 to 2,800. The parking would provide the conservancy with about $13 million annually.
In addition, the conservancy plan calls for the creation of a 100,000-square-foot educational component to generate another $4 million annually, and a 238,000-square-foot Visual Arts Market with an assumed annual revenue for the conservancy of $4.7 million.
According to a very long article by Lincoln Anderson in The Villager, "the pier's annual total revenues from tenants would be $24 million" and "after expenses, $15 million would be left, which would cove the annual $5 million rent payment to the Trust, plus the rate of return on the I.D.A. tax-exempt bonds" the conservancy would issue to pay for fixing up the facility.
Mr. Anderson's article also quoted Connie Fishman, the president of the Hudson River Park Trust, as saying it will evaluate the Pier 40 Partnership report "thoroughly, along with the two development proposals currently under consideration, in the weeks ahead."
Recently, the article continued, "Tobi Bergman, president of the Pier Park & Playground Association, which runs youth sports programs on the pier, had expressed some initial support" for a proposal to park city garbage trucks on the pier for additional revenue, "but has since drawn away from it."
The Hudson River Park Trust maintains it must develop the pier to create revenue for the upkeep of the five-mile park, which was chartered in 1998 and is still under construction.
The Hudson River Park Act disallowed hotels, residential uses, manufacturing, warehousing, office uses not related to permitted park uses and gambling vessels on the site that was built in 1954 for the Holland America Line as a commercial shipping terminal. The pier subsequently was used for storage, offices and a bus depot before it was converted to a public parking garage and a soccer field was built atop the two-story pier building in 1999, and other sports fields and park space have since been added.
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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