Sunday, July 6, 2008

City agencies moving to Queens

The Health Department is poised to sign a deal to move some of its 15 downtown offices into 18 floors of a new building to be erected on the site of a decrepit parking garage at Queens Plaza.

I've still got some moves, Mike Bloomberg says

The Correction Department will leave its Hudson St. headquarters and a Battery Park location for the former Bulova watch headquarters building in Astoria, Queens - putting top brass closer to Rikers Island.

Bloomberg campaigned in 2001 on a promise of moving city offices to less-crowded and less-expensive office space in outer boroughs. His "campaign accountability" scorecard on the city Web site said he achieved that years ago by moving five downtown Sanitation Department offices to Queens.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Great, the public is subsidizing that Queens Plaza with tax breaks, the resources of city government, even connecting to the power grid.

Take a look who owns it. A real plutocrat. Would love see how much the executives in that firm are paying for summer vacations this year while you and I sweat and slave to earn money to subsidize them with our taxes.

Now they want us to fork over even more tax dollars to pay for rentals to make this boondoogle work.

And oh yes, don't worry. It will have new sidewalks, new trees and BIKE LANES!

Bastards.

Anonymous said...

Department of Health is moving to Queens. After spending 10+ millions last year on new office space and data center at 22 Cortlandt Street.

Anonymous said...

I think its a great idea. There is no reason that city agencies should be sucking up prime real estate in Manhattan.
They can sell the real estate and operate at a third of the costs in Queens also bringing more jobs and commerce to Queens while giving the plaza an anchor tenant.
Bravo!

Anonymous said...

Agree with #3. Kudos to Bloomberg on this one.

C said...

This is like the 5th comment I've seen regarding BIKE LANES!

I know a bunch have just been painted (seemingly at random) in Howard Beach.

What's the deal with the bike lanes everywhere?

Anonymous said...

Can't the city just switch places with MetLife at the soon-to-be vacated MetLife Bldg in Queens Plaza?

Seriously though, why is more office space needed there when a massive vacancy is about to occur across the street? Maybe retail (like Target) would be a better option?

Anonymous said...

There actually isnt enough space in Long Island City for all of these government agencies, Even with the Met Life space currently on the market. Besides, I think its great that the parking garage is being torn down. Either way, the new buildings are going to be built...might as well put the city in there and save money.