Plan to demolish historic NYC rowhouses gets pushback; developer promises improvement
WASHINGTON HEIGHTS, Manhattan (PIX11) — They were among the first homes in Washington Heights, but now a row of nearly 130-year-old structures is scheduled to be demolished and replaced by a high-rise building whose developer promises will have 40% of its apartments below market-rate.
The developer calls it an improvement for the community, but some residents say it’s a case of history being lost, and hassles being gained. The likelihood of the demolition and development ceasing is reducing daily, but some residents vow to keep fighting.
The row of six brick and limestone townhouses at 636 through 646 West 158th Street has been cited by the Historic Districts Council, the non-profit preservation organization, as being among its Six To Celebrate — a designation highlighting the historic, architectural, and aesthetic value of certain buildings in the city.
A variety of residents agree.
“They’re beautiful, they’re beautiful,” said a woman who said she lives in a building that faces the row of homes. “I think they should be kept. Period,” she said.
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The homes were built by a developer in the last decade of the 1800s as five-story showplaces for their residents. Now, though, the only people going in or coming out of them are construction workers prepping the buildings for demolition.
“That’s why everybody is like somber,” said Orlando Saeroon. He’s the live-in super of a building that’s directly behind the row that’s slated for demolition. He described residents of his building as being “sad and upset that this is happening.”
He’s by no means alone. A number of community newsletters and other outlets, including Nextdoor, have threads of messages of people concerned about the loss of the rowhouses, and the addition of a building that’s much taller and larger than the ones its replacing.
The battle to prevent the demolition and replacement has been going on for the better part of a decade. It’s included efforts to add the row of homes to the Audubon Park Historic District, and in the process protect them from destruction. The district’s boundary, however, which is determined by the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission, stops just feet away from the row of homes.
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Some longtime residents say that any new development should be similar in scale to what’s there already.
“What’s wrong with townhouses, right?” asked Gloria Sponner, who said she’s lived in Washington Heights for “many years.”
“Do we need 16 stories, or 13, or 12 even?” she asked.
A building with 140 rental units, 42 of which will be “affordable rate,” according to developer Artisan Real Estate, is what’s planned for the location, which is between the West Side Highway and Broadway.
Skeptics, however, are not convinced that the new building will be an improvement. Instead, they said, it will be part of what they fear is a trend of building higher than human scale in uptown neighborhoods.
A 28-story rental tower opened last year five blocks from the row houses, and it towers above all the buildings within sight.
Also, some residents are concerned about practical issues related to the construction of the proposed new building.
“Not only the noise, like when they start building,” said Saeroon, the man who lives next door to the site. He also expressed concern about “all the rats that will be exposed.”
For its part, developer Artifact Real Estate released a statement, that said, in part:
“We get it: no one likes major construction in their backyard. But that’s not sufficient reason to hold up or cancel the construction of an important mixed-use building that’s bringing a lot of much-needed housing into the community. Beyond those few neighbors’ annoyance about construction, all other objections have been thoroughly reviewed and discredited over the last several years.
We have hired a world-class architecture firm to design a building that will be a positive contribution to the area. We tasked the architects with designing a building that’s contextual with the adjoining buildings and the neighborhood generally. The new building also includes references to historic elements common to the Audubon Park District.”
Artifact Real Estate
The company also said that two of the homes had been vacant for years, and “had ongoing issues with squatters, trespassers doing drugs inside, and terrible rat infestation that was affecting the whole area.”
There is a community board meeting on Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. Some local residents said that they intend to attend and protest the demolition plan.
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