Admiral's Row supermarket: take 3

From Crains:

The Brooklyn Navy Yard, the huge industrial park on the East River waterfront below Williamsburg, is hoping that three's a charm for a large development site called Admiral's Row on the property's southwest corner.

On Monday, the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corp. released a request for proposals to build a big supermarket there, as well as additional retail space that could house shops or restaurants and more office and industrial space.

It is the third time that the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corp., the nonprofit that operates the area, solicited developers for the site in as many years after two previous winners for the site, PA Associates and subsequently Blumenfeld Development Group, were dropped.

The nonprofit predicts that the project will require more than $100 million of investment and will generate 500 jobs. The deal will be structured so that the winning developer will lease the site long term.

David Ehrenberg, the president and CEO of the Brooklyn Navy Yard, said the development would provide both the neighborhood and the 300-acre Navy Yard complex with a long-needed go-to place for groceries.

"This area currently qualifies as a food desert," Mr. Ehrenberg said. "We wanted to provide a supermarket for the surrounding community and also give the growing numbers of workers at the Navy Yard a place to eat and get a cup of coffee."

The Admiral's Row development will also allow the Navy Yard to add about 127,000 square feet of office and industrial space. That square footage will largely be on the second floor of a new building that will house the supermarket on its ground floor.

Admiral's Row is named for the stately, but now badly deteriorated houses at the site that once housed the base's top naval brass. Those buildings have decayed to the point where they will have to be razed, Mr. Ehrenberg said. But two structures, one of the houses and also a historic lumber shed are required to be fully refurbished as part of the RFP. Those could be home to shops or restaurants in the new development, he said.

New flood zones sink Navy Yard project

From Crains:

Blumenfeld Development Group has been dropped as the builder of the $100 million Admiral's Row project, an expansion to the 300-acre industrial space in Brooklyn that is slated to include a supermarket and shopping center, Crain's has learned.

The move comes more than a year after the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development, the nonprofit that manages the city-owned site, selected Blumenfeld to build a 74,000 square-foot supermarket, 86,000 square feet of retail space and 125,000 square feet of industrial space at the city-owned industrial park. Blumenfeld was one of several companies to respond to a request for proposals to develop the project.
Navy Yard President and Chief Executive David Ehrenberg said in a statement that Blumenfeld failed to meet its end of the contract, declining to elaborate on the reasons for change in plans. Under the agreement, Blumenfeld was supposed to be granted a long-term lease at the site after selecting a supermarket operator. A supermarket has not been picked. Blumenfeld was slated to break ground on the development this year.

"We are still committed to Admiral's Row being anchored by a supermarket that meets the community's needs and an industrial facility that supports our core mission," Mr. Ehrenberg said. "The city-approved site plan remains in place and we are evaluating our options for moving forward."

Blumenfeld said it is no longer involved in the Navy Yard because the project became untenable after changes to the Federal Emergency Management Agency's preliminary revised flood zones. The change would increase flood insurance premiums and construction costs, the developer noted.

Once it's gone, it's gone forever

From the NY Post:

Wrecking balls are threatening to take aim at historic buildings in three unique parts of the city — thanks to neglect, insufficient funds and inappropriate development.

The areas are among the nation’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places, according to the National Trust for Historic Places, which started its list 25 years ago.

Yesterday, it released a list of the fates of the areas and buildings that made its lists over the last quarter century.

The parts of the Big Apple still at risk are:

* The south side of the Ellis Island hospital complex, where immigrants were treated from 1892 to 1954.

* The cornices and buildings of Harlem, where some of the most famous black musicians, artists and literary figures worked and lived.

* Brooklyn’s industrial waterfront, where, the trust notes, nine of the 11 buildings on Admirals Row in the Brooklyn Navy Yard are scheduled to be destroyed to make way for a supermarket and retail complex.

National Guard wants to junk Admirals' Row

From Brownstoner:

Here's the latest in depressing Admiral's Row news: According to Fort Greene-Clinton Hill Patch, last week the National Guard sent a letter to local politicians telling them Building B has been deemed beyond repair, which means the Guard has washed its hands of one of only two buildings on the row that were supposed to be preserved. In February, the National Guard said the other building that was supposed to be salvaged, the Timber Shed, was also too far gone to be preserved. According to last week's letter, one of Building B's walls has partially collapsed and is unstable. Thus, the Navy Guard is not going to make any moves to preserve either building while it has custodianship of the row; as noted last week, it's unclear when the Navy Yard Development Corporation will be able to take control of the row and, in the meantime, the Development Corp. is not allowed to access the buildings in order to try and preserve them.

Admirals' Row in limbo

From the NY Times:

In recent months, preservationists and some advocates in the neighborhood have embraced the Navy Yard corporation’s plan, agreeing to save the shed and just one town house — Quarters B, the oldest, but the one in the best condition — and tear down the remaining buildings. The cleared land would then make way for a supermarket that the 13,000 residents of the three nearby housing projects have long desired, a retail plaza and a new light-industry building.

The entire plan’s price tag is $70 million, with $10 million dedicated to renovating the two historic buildings, whose costs the developer would pay as part of the lease.

But the hope that the steady decay might finally be stanched has been set back by the National Guard’s resistance toward allowing any work that would stabilize the dilapidated Admiral’s Row structures as long as the Guard remains the custodian.

The property cannot be transferred to the Navy Yard corporation until a historical and environmental review is completed. How long that process will take is unclear, and until then Admiral’s Row will remain in limbo.

Navy Yard needs new developer

From the Real Deal:

The non-profit Brooklyn Navy Yard Development removed PA Associates as a designated developer on its high-profile Admiral's Row project a day after one of the firm's founders was charged in a $1 million federal bribery investigation. The quasi-governmental entity today “terminated the designation of PA Admirals Row LLC as the developer of the Admiral's Row site," the corporation said in a statement to The Real Deal. PA Admirals Row LLC is an affiliate of Midtown-based PA Associates, which was approved as the developer to partner with grocery chain ShopRite on the $60 million project to build a grocery store. Yesterday federal prosecutors charged Aaron Malinsky, a principal and founder of PA Associates, of funneling $472,500 in bribes to State Senator Carl Kruger.

Admiral's Row building in danger of collapse

Photo from Gothamist

From the Daily News:

A historic Admiral's Row building could soon be gone for good if the feds keep neglecting it, Navy Yard officials and preservationists have warned.

The Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corp. plans to restore the 1830s-era Timber Shed - one of two Admiral's Row buildings they agreed to save from the wrecking ball after a long fight.

But unless the 19th-century structure is stabilized, it could collapse this winter before the group gets its hands on the property, now owned by the National Guard.

And it's not just the Timber Shed that's at risk - a $60 million deal to develop the site with a supermarket and industrial space could also fall through if it crumbles, officials said.

"The building is in real distress. The roof is starting to fall in," said Navy Yard Development Corp. President Andrew Kimball. "If action isn't taken very, very soon to stabilize the building, it will collapse."

Part of the roof of the Timber Shed - which was used to store ships' masts while they cured and is believed to be the last such structure of its kind in the country - already caved in during a snowstorm last winter.

Experts say the building can still be saved, but could be beyond repair if it's damaged further. Navy Yard officials hope to rehab it along with one of the stately former officers' homes that make up the. The rest will be razed to make way for a ShopRite and industrial space.

Saving the shed is a required part of the city's development deal with the federal government, Kimball said, adding that demolishing it "could jeopardize the whole project."

The feds have begun the process to sell the land to the city, but it's expected to take at least until the end of next summer. In the meantime, the Navy Yard wants the National Guard to either stabilize the building or let the Navy Yard's own developer do the work.

Admirals Row building collapses

SPECIAL PRESERVATION ALERT

Dereliction of Duty: National Guard Allows Admiral's Row to Collapse

The Historic Districts Council was dismayed to learn earlier today about the collapse of one of the NR-eligible properties in Admiral's Row, in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. (http://curbed.com/archives/2009/06/19/curbedwire_am_special_collapse_on_admirals_row.php)

We are outraged that the National Guard has allowed this to happen in direct violation of their own policy. Since the beginning of the environmental mitigation process to supervise the transfer of these buildings to the City, HDC has repeatedly and publicly insisted that the buildings be secured against further deterioration http://www.nan.usace.army.mil/business/buslinks/admiral/pdf/aug08/minutes.pdf.

The unwillingness to protect publicly-owned historic properties, in direct opposition to Department of Defense Regulations (http://www.army.mil/usapa/epubs/pdf/r200_1.pdf or

http://www.achp.gov/army.html), casts serious doubt on the independence of the environmental consulting process and suggests that the fate of these important historic resources was already determined outside of public purview. HDC demands that the National Guard Bureau explain why the mandated measures to protect these buildings were not taken.

Please email the National Guard at AdmiralsRowBNY@usace.army.mil to request that they explain their lack of action in securing these historic structures.

Photo from Curbed

Bloomberg will obliterate Admirals Row

From the Brooklyn Paper:

The city and National Guard reached an agreement to save two decrepit, yet historic, buildings in the Brooklyn Navy Yard and destroy eight others, ending an impasse and allowing the Navy Yard to proceed with its controversial plan to build a supermarket.

The deal, announced by a spokesman for the city-run Navy Yard, does not guarantee the preservation of the low-slung Timber Shed and one of the former officers’ homes, known as Building B, which faces Flushing Avenue. But it allows for the transfer of the federally owned “Admirals Row” area to the city, which owns the rest of the Navy Yard.

As part of the deal, the city would then solicit bids from developers to build a supermarket and an industrial building as well as to “test the market” to rehabilitate and maintain the two crumbling 19th-century structures.

It’s unclear how the historic buildings would be reused. The other eight buildings along the row could be demolished by the city, under this agreement.

Admirals Row demo delay

A plan to tear down 10 historic houses at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and replace them with a supermarket has been delayed indefinitely thanks to a decision by federal officials to review whether the dilapidated 150-year-old mansions can be saved.

Officers’ Row Supermarket Not Happening Anytime Soon

Admirals Row, which overlooks Flushing Avenue near Navy Street, sits on six acres of federally owned land in the otherwise city-controlled Navy Yard.

The National Guard wants to sell the land, and according to local law, must give the city first dibs. But because of the houses’ historic significance, the Guard must also go through an arduous public comment and historic review process.

Photo from the Brooklyn Paper

Report: Admirals Row houses can be saved

The historic Admiral's Row mansions are in better shape than they appear and could be saved, a federal study has found.

Admiral's Row fixup to cost $20M

A report commissioned by the National Guard - which owns the 10 buildings in the Brooklyn Navy Yard that housed naval officers and their families for nearly a century - found that eight are "structurally sound" and in no danger of collapsing.

Navy Yard officials, who want to tear down the houses and build a supermarket, were angry about the report's findings - and immediately started playing hardball.

"If the federal government...requires that some or all of these structures be rebuilt from the ground up...neither the City of New York or the [Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corp.] are interested in acquiring and developing the site and it will continue to lay fallow for years to come," wrote Navy Yard Development Corp. President Andrew Kimball yesterday in response to the report.

Photo from Curbed