The building sits at 321-323 East 60th Street between First and Second avenues.
In case you've been living under bedrock, buildable land is scarce in Manhattan. Gas stations, parking lots, railyards, and taxpayers are the usual easy pickings gobbled up by our ravenous developers to house our growing populace. As these lots become more scare, formerly overlooked scraps of land become enticing. Illustrating how NYC developers will leave no spare FAR unturned, Azimuth Development Group are developing an eight story apartment on a 3,749 square-foot, Nevada-shaped parcel overlooking an off-ramp to the Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge. The former parking lot at 321-323 East 60th Street between First and Second avenues was part of a portfolio of seven buildings sold by Arthur Brown, a co-founder of Manhattan plumbing company Holby Valve.
Azimuth, who has developed a number of affordable housing projects throughout the city, is building a 21-unit, 25,069 square foot rental building at the site, where 100% of the apartments will be earmarked for low-income households. The developers purchased the hemmed-in lot for $12 million ($3,200 per square foot) in 2015 and filed permits shortly after. Though the price may seem steep, especially for affordable housing, broker David Schechtman of Eastern Consolidated in 2014 told The Real Deal that the site’s appeal is that a developer can opt-in to the city’s Inclusionary Housing Program, which would generate 80,000 square feet of transferable air rights to anywhere within the Upper East Side's district for Community Board 8.
Aufgang Architects are the designers, and penned their usual blocky patchwork of stucco and brick materials for the exterior. The first floor will host a garage with nine parking spaces, a residential lobby, and bike storage. The next seven floors are essentially identical and each will have three units and a shared laundry room. One perk of having an elevated off-ramp running over your front door is that the building will have one of the largest canopies in the city. The property has already risen to its sixth floor, and should be complete early next year 2017.
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