The State Assembly held a PUBLIC HEARING on November 25th about affordable housing and raising the FAR (Floor Area Ratio) cap!
Assemblymember Linda B. Rosenthal tweeted from the hearing "... @NYCHousing refuses to take position on removing FAR cap, punts to city planning. My bill, A5026, will close #mechanicalvoids loophole used by developers to circumvent zoning & build supertowers, NYC needs affordable housing, not luxury towers."
Bills to lift the FAR cap failed to advance in both the 2015-2016 and 2018-2019 legislative sessions. We hope this hearing will be the end of the matter. Members of our community including representatives from Save Central Park NYC and The West 64th thru West 67th Streets Block Association, Assemblymember Linda B. Rosenthal, and City Council Member Ben Kallos all expressed concern that “affordable housing” is being used to override height limits in contextually zoned areas.
Save Central Park NYC stressed that quality of life should be paramount, especially when considering those in affordable housing. Children at play in dark, cold parks is not a reasonable outcome. Darkened parks and streets are also not safe and will greatly diminish the livability of NYC.
Affordable housing sites historically have been zoned as R9 or less. Developers are not likely to build expensive towers for the purposes of affordable housing. This is an obvious bait and switch and should not be allowed. The economics of a supertall would not work for affordable housing and developers and REBNY know it! Empty tall buildings will not yield more affordable housing!
We know many of you who could not testify submitted written testimony. Thank you!!