200 Amsterdam Tops Out On UWS Despite Legal Battle

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — A fast-rising Upper West Side development has topped out despite an ongoing legal battle to determine whether the tower is being built in accordance with the city's zoning laws.

The luxury apartment building 200 Amsterdam Avenue reached its peak at 52 stories Wednesday, with work on the building's decorative crown to be finished in September, a spokeswoman for developer SJP Properties said in a statement. The 668-foot-tall building will be the tallest on the Upper West Side when it is completed.

"200 Amsterdam, our prized new development in the heart of Lincoln Square, has reached its top residential floor today (52). 200 Amsterdam’s distinctive crown feature is expected to be completed in September," SJP Properties said in a statement. "Construction commenced in the fall of 2017 and has continued unabated since. We look forwarding to officially launching sales also this September."

Preservation groups such as the Municipal Arts Society and the Committee for Environmentally Sound Development have challenged 200 Amsterdam since plans for the building were revealed. Opponents of the development claim that its "gerrymandered" zoning lot — which stretches far beyond the building site — violates the city's zoning codes. Local elected officials such as City Councilmember Helen Rosenthal, Borough President Gale Brewer and Sate Assemblymember Linda Rosenthal support the challenge against 200 Amsterdam.

The groups were able to get a 2018 Board of Standards and Appeals approval of the development vacated in Manhattan Supreme Court, but the board re-approved the building plans this year. In the wake of that approval, lawyers representing the groups filed a new Article 78 challenge against the development in July.

"The BSA's continued refusal to listen to reason has forced us to return to the State Supreme Court on an issue that should be a matter of common sense," Elizabeth Goldstein, President of the Municipal Art Society, said in a statement. "The 39-sided zoning lot at 200 Amsterdam Avenue is an affront to both the letter and the spirit of the Zoning Resolution."

Attorney Richard Emry, who is representing opponents of the building, told Patch in June that he interpreted Justice Perry's March ruling to mean that combined zoning lots cannot include partial tax lots. The Board of Standards and Appeals seem to believe the opposite due to the fact that the city Department of Buildings has approved building permits for developments on 200 Amsterdam Ave's block that use combined zoning lots that do include partial tax lots, Emery said in June.

Attempts to secure a temporary restraining order to prevent construction at the 200 Amsterdam Ave. site were denied in Manhattan Supreme Court earlier this year.

Developers SJP Properties and Japanese-based Mitsui Fudosan have framed legal challenges against the building as an effort by Upper West Side "NIMBYs" (Not in my Backyard) that don't want to see a tall building go up near their homes despite the fact that other buildings on the block follow similar interpretations of the city's zoning rules.

When 200 Amsterdam Ave. was first proposed it was to become the tallest building on the Upper West Side. Extell Development's proposed 15 W. 65th St. — which would rise 775-feet-tall — has since taken that title. Neighborhood groups and politicians are also fighting Extell's development.