Sutton Place Rezoning Plan Will Face Challenges During Public Review, City Planners Say

SUTTON PLACE, NY — A rezoning application filed by a group of Sutton Place residents to curb the construction of super-tall development in their neighborhood may run into some challenges when it's certified for public review, Department of City Planning staffers told Patch.

In the context of Mayor Bill de Blasio's affordable housing agenda, which holds the idea that all newly-created housing is good for the affordable housing crisis, the Sutton Place rezoning plan places onerous requirements on developers which may prevent the creation of affordable housing units, a spokesman for the Department of City Planning Said.

The Sutton Place rezoning plan, submitted to the department by the East River 50s Alliance, would cap building heights at 260 feet in Sutton Place, Lisa Mercurio of the East River 50s Alliance told Patch. Currently the neighborhood's R10 zoning, applied in the 1960s, does not limit building height at all. (For more New York City news delivered straight to your inbox sign up for Patch's free newsletters and breaking news alerts.)

"We believe strongly that planners in 1961 never had buildings of 700, 800 or 900 feet in mind," Mercurio told Patch. "It would have been science fiction in the engineering of the times."

The rezoning plan was created to block projects such as 3 Sutton Place. The neighborhood alarms were sounded when developer Joseph Beninati's Bauhouse Group scooped up the three-building site on East 58th Street and planned to build a 950-foot residential tower, more than double the height of the tallest existing building in the neighborhood. Out-of-context buildings, especially those built on one-way side streets, would dramatically alter the quality of life in the small neighborhood for the worse, Mercurio told Patch.

The application would also convert the area into an Inclusionary Housing Designated Area, a move which city planners think will actually make the construction of affordable housing less common in the neighborhood.

The city's theory is that if developers are allowed to build taller, denser residential towers then a larger number of below-market units will in turn be created. When developers apply for certain tax abatements they agree to offer a portion of a building's apartment units at below-market prices. If more total apartments are built, there's greater the potential for more affordable apartments, a spokesman for the Department of City Planning said.

But there are downsides to relying on tax abatement programs to solve the city's affordable housing crisis. A recent report from the city's Independent Budget Office found that $2.5 to $2.8 billion was wasted between 2005 and 2015 on the 421-a tax abatement alone. Below-market housing financed by tax abatements such as 421-a is also not permanent, as opposed to programs like the city's Voluntary Inclusionary Housing Progam, which the Sutton Place rezoning application calls for.

Despite any holdups the Department of City Planning has about the plan, which they have discussed with the applicant, the department will certify the application for public review when it's completed, a department spokesman told Patch. After certification the rezoning application will go to the Community Board and Borough President's office for advisory votes. Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer has previously voiced support for the rezoning plan.

After going through the advisory votes, the plan will then voted on by the City Planning Commission — not to be confused with the Department of City Planning — and the City Council.

Check out some renderings detailing the rezoning's possible effect on the neighborhood below:

Photo courtesy of the East River 50s Alliance