Carlton Regency South, 137 East 36th Street: Review and Ratings

Review of 137 East 36th Street by Carter Horsley

This 26-story apartment tower is one of the best post-war buildings in the Murray Hill district. It was erected in 1966 and converted to a cooperative in 1979.

Most of its 225 apartments have very large, protruding bay windows that give the tower an interesting form. The building has a concierge, doorman, and an impressive lobby.

Less than two blocks from the wonderful Morgan Library at Madison Avenue, this building is in a very attractive neighborhood noted for convenience to the midtown office district. It is two blocks north of cross-town buses and a few blocks away from a local subway station and six blocks south of Grand Central Terminal.

Although traffic going to the nearby Queens-Midtown Tunnel was once viewed as a negative in the area, most of that traffic is on Third and Second Avenues and the development of a luxury apartment enclave on the other side of the tunnel entrance near the East River and the renaissance of the Midtown South and Flatiron Districts to the south have made this neighborhood considerably more desirable in recent years.

This building has a very large and nicely landscaped plaza that is raised several feet above the sidewalk.  It also has a rear courtyard for parties, a fitness center and a roof deck.

It also serves as the entrance to the Carlton Regency North tower at 136 East 37th Street, which has a large arcade on the sidestreet and Madison Avenue but no longer has its own separate entrance. The north tower is somewhat older and not as handsome as the south tower but on the other hand it has better views to the north.