CB Meeting Set For Controversial Demolition Of Village Townhouses

GREENWICH VILLAGE, NY — A Community Board 2 meeting is set as the venue for the release of construction plans to demolish two 172-year-old Greenwich Village townhouses and replace them with a residential high-rise building.

The townhouses in question are located at 14 and 16 Fifth Avenue.

Plans to demolish the five-story, 20-unit buildings were first filed around January 2020 by Madison Realty Capital.

After an immediate pushback from the community, an initially released plan for the new building went from a 367-feet tall, 21-story construction project to a 19-story building project. However, the exact height and design will not be revealed until the Community Board 2 Landmarks Committee meeting on Tuesday, Feb. 16.

In a previous NYC Landmarks Commission meeting, the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation provided a detailed breakdown of the two building's history and former tenants.

Prior owners of the buildings include a chairman of the New York Republican State Committee, a Civil War general, and a managing editor of the Mademoiselle Magazine.

The pair of buildings were constructed together in 1848.

"We strongly oppose this plan, which would involve the demolition of two altered but incredibly historically significant landmarked townhouses which were home to some of the greatest industrialists, artists, writers, actors, philanthropists, and jurists of the last two centuries and were key to the development of our neighborhood and our city," said Andrew Berman, the Executive Director of the Greenwich Village Society For Historic Preservation, in a news release.

The Community Board 2 meeting will include an advisory vote, but the actual application will be decided on in a Landmarks Preservation Commission hearing that is not yet scheduled.

You can register for the Feb. 16th Community Board 2 meeting on the subject here.