The New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development announced yesterday that new data from the U.S. Census Bureau has indicated that New York City had 31,918 building permits for privately-owned residential units last year, the highest total since 1972.

Last year was the third in a row the city had more than 30,000 units permitted, the first time that has occurred since records began to kept I 1976.

Shaun Donovan, the commissioner of the department, said that "These numbers are great news, both for subsidized and non-subsidized housing alike," adding that "this historic rate of development is helping to close a housing gap that has placed significant upward pressure on the city's housing prices."

"In conjunction with the Mayor's 165,000 unit New Housing Marketplace Plan," he continued, "these new homes will help to increase the affordability of the city's housing market while, at the same time, preparing the city for the arrival of almost one million additional New Yorkers over the next two decades."

Seventy percent of the permits issued last year were for units in the Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island.

The department's press release note that "Since Mayor Bloomberg came to office seventy-four percent of new housing permits have been in the outer boroughs, compared to only sixty-two percent in the previous three decades."

"In addition," it declared, "much of the new construction in the outer boroughs includes market-rate homes affordable to middle-income families."

Manhattan had 9,520 permits issued for new apartments last year compared with 8,790 in 2006, but the city's "leader" was Brooklyn, which had 10,930 permits last year compared with 9,191 in 2006.

The press release noted that "while The Bronx and Staten Island saw permit numbers decline, The Bronx still posted the fourth highest total in more than three decades."