West Side Stadium Clears First Hurdle

New York, Nov. 5 - The Hudson Yards redevelopment plan touted by Mayor Michael Bloomberg logged an early approval milestone yesterday when the Empire State Development Corporation, as expected, adopted a general project plan for the $1.4 billion New York Sports and Convention Center. The plan would create a 2.2-million s.f. facility on Manhattan's West Side, including a 75,000-seat open-air stadium for the New York Jets football team, an 180,000-s.f. exhibition hall, and 18,000 s.f. of meeting rooms linked to the neighboring Jacob Javits Convention Center.

The vote, approved by the ESDC's board of directors at a special meeting yesterday, kicks off a public comment period, followed by review of the input and another vote for affirmation by the board. From there, it would advance to the state's Public Authority Control Board in Albany for approval, said Charles Gargano, chairman of the ESDC. On the same track, he added, the Jets are negotiating with the Metropolitan Transit Authority for air rights to build on the stadium site, which would be above a major rail yard.

Yesterday's approval was no surprise, Gargano said. "We had been working on this general project plan for quite some time," he said. The 14-page document outlines the major project goals and details on construction, projected use, and financing.

The plan follows earlier steps, including a Memorandum of Understanding between the city and state governments to create a West Side "convention corridor" and a Draft Generic Environmental Impact Statement for the whole Hudson Yards plan, which the MTA and Department of City Planning had certified last June. A final environmental impact statement is expected this month.

The board touted the stadium proposal, which it said could generate more than $1 billion in city and state tax revenue and more than 7,200 construction jobs. It would entail $600 million in state and city funding, largely to construct a steel and concrete platform over the rail yards between W. 30th and W. 33rd streets, and between 11th and 12th avenues. Another $800 million from the Jets would build the steel-and-glass stadium, though the public bodies would fund a retractable roof. According to a press release, the Jets would also fund public infrastructure work, including access to the waterfront and pedestrian bridges.

In addition to the Jets, the stadium would be usable for convention events and possibly the Olympics were the city to win a pending bid for the 2012 games.

Gargano said the approval track is moving concurrently with the air rights negotiations. "If all goes as planned, we could break ground next spring," he said. "Now of course, we're expecting the challenges." To date, a group of residents, activists, and city officials has formed the Hell's Kitchen/Hudson Yards Alliance to oppose the stadium. It has drafted a rival development plan, and some of its members have sued the city and MTA to derail the plan. The Dolan family, which owns Cablevision and Madison Square Garden, has mounted a similar effort called the New York Association for Better Choices, which is running a TV ad campaign.

In a statement, that group called the ESDC vote "a meaningless rubber stamp by captive appointees to a state agency at the beginning of a long process [that] will have no bearing on whether the West Side stadium project proceeds."

For now, the next step is a public hearing that the ESDC board must hold within 30 days. A 30-day public comment period follows.

Industry Leaders: Coordination Crucial to Manage Construction Boom

New York, Nov. 5 - The expected surge in construction activity over the next 15 years in New York City demands massive coordination and planning for resources, industry leaders said yesterday at a panel discussion sponsored by the Greater New York Construction User Council.

One of the greatest expansions in the city's history looms, said Lou Coletti, president and CEO of the Building Trades Employers' Association, who moderated the event and cited the redevelopments of Downtown Manhattan, Hudson Yards, and the Yankee Stadium area, among others. Each panelist he introduced struck parts of the same theme - the urgency for all players to coordinate closely both to manage multiple construction projects in already congested areas and to ensure that the ultimate products mesh well together and with local infrastructure.

Lower Manhattan is clearly a centerpiece of the coming boom, said Anthony Cracchiolo, director of priority capital programs at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, who was a panelist at the event. He said the $11 billion in investment planned for the World Trade Center area is spurring many other projects in the surrounding neighborhoods.

Frank Sciame, president of F.J. Sciame Construction Co., also on the panel, echoed that point. He said the plan for the area to house major new commercial and cultural facilities has inspired developers to approach the area with bold visions and tantalizing designs, citing his company's own planned 835-foot Santiago-Calatrava designed tower at 80 South St. that will feature "mansions in the sky."

Successful redevelopment of the World Trade Center site - with a central business district, vibrant residential community, and core transportation links - hinges on such organization, said Kevin Rampe, president of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation. To that end, he said Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Gov. George Pataki are forming the Lower Manhattan Construction Coordination Group, a unit that will manage the transit element, help meet goals to reflect diversity in the trades and on individual jobs, and effectively serve in a broad construction manager role for the entire redevelopment.

With sufficient funding available from federal and state coffers, Rampe said a primary objective of the massive private and public redevelopment is effectively incorporating new transportation facilities. "The transportation is the key, and we at the LMDC believe the key project is the development of a rail link to downtown for the Long Island Rail Road and JFK Airport,' Rampe said.

Coordination will also be instrumental in plans to redevelop the Hudson Yards area on the West Side, said John Livingston, president for eastern operations at Tishman Construction Corporation. His company is owner's representative for the New York Jets on a planned 75,000-seat stadium that anchors the Hudson Yards proposal.

Livingston cited the need for contractors to wisely plan ahead for their materials needs, especially with ongoing crunches for steel and concrete. He said it will be critical to track activity around the globe - in particular, the huge demand for materials from China and in Florida. "This requires massive coordination and logistics," he said.

He also cited the need to plan for sufficient labor resources to handle expected job levels in the metropolitan area, including negotiating new contracts with unions. He added that the industry must be ready for the possibility that winning the 2012 Olympics will expand the coming scope even further.

Underneath the city, meanwhile, the Metropolitan Transit Authority is planning the first major expansion of the subway system in 60 years - building the 2nd Avenue subway and extending the 7 line west to the Hudson Yards site. Those projects are major priorities for the proposed 2005-2009 capital plan, said Mysore Nagaraja, president of the MTA's capital construction unit.

The plan also envisions opening access to Grand Central for LIRR commuters, the major reconfiguration of stations serving 14 downtown subway lines to create the Fulton Street Transportation Center, and the expansion of the 1 and 9 subway's South Ferry Station meeting the Staten Island Ferry.

Planning work has already begun, with completion expected later in the decade for many of those projects. Nagaraja said many of them incorporate - or envision using - green design and construction methods. "We are going to adopt sustainability in all the work we're doing," he said.

Rampe added that development at the former World Trade Center site also calls for green construction standards, including air quality control, low sulfur fuel use, and noise control.

While many of the projects are a few years off in the future, some elements are moving forward, including plans to advertise next week for a contractor to take on construction of the permanent Port Authority Trans-Hudson (PATH) terminal at the World Trade Center site, according to Cracchiolo. The MTA's Nagaraja added that solicitation for design-build proposals for the South Ferry and 7 subway extension jobs is also moving forward.

Mayor Unveils $66 Million Staten Island Redevelopment

New York City has issued Requests for Proposals for engineering and landscape design work that will underpin a major redevelopment of Homeport, a section of the Stapleton neighborhood on the North Shore waterfront of Staten Island. The city has set aside $66 million for infrastructure improvements over five years that will support the Homeport redevelopment plan, according to a press release. Construction is slated to begin in 2006, kicking off a two- to three-year timetable.

The city's Economic Development Corporation issued the RFPs, a first step in redeveloping the former naval base into a mixed-use community with residential, commercial, and retail districts. Plans for the site include a community sports complex, banquet hall, restaurant, and farmers market, along with a restoration of historic Tappen Park.

The plans drew from the Homeport Task Force, which the city established last year to cull community input. The plan for the 36-acre site envisions 350 residential units in three buildings, 600,000 s.f. of retail and other uses, open space, a waterfront esplanade, additional commercial facilities, parking, and streetscape improvements.

One RFP seeks consultants for engineering design services for roadway, esplanade, and bulkhead engineering, while the second seeks landscape design services for the streetscape along Front Street and the planned esplanade.

Work on Tappen Park could begin sooner than the rest of the project. The mayor has allocated $400,000 for a first phase to construct new pathways throughout the park starting in Spring 2005.

Gotham's Holloway Joins Plaza Construction

Michael Holloway has joined Plaza Construction Company as a vice president and head of its newly created residential division. The industry veteran comes to Plaza from a five-year run as president of Gotham Construction.

The move is a bid to expand Plaza's high-rise residential construction business, which has been a fast-growing sector, according to a press release. Holloway manages the day-to-day operations of multi-family projects, overseeing field operations, project management, accounting, billing, purchasing, estimating, and safety protocols. He coordinates the entire construction effort, including materials, labor, and schedule.

Richard Wood, Plaza's president, and Steven Fisher, its chairman and CEO, have shifted their focus to new business development initiatives and managing business growth.

Holloway had previously spent 20 years at Bovis Lend Lease, finishing in the post of director of operations in the New York office.

Port Authority Taps Ringler as Chief

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey's board of commissioners tapped Kenneth Ringler Jr. as its new executive director. He succeeds Joseph Seymour, who retired.

Gov. George Pataki nominated Ringler for the director's post. Ringler had previously been New York State Commissioner of General Services

Industry Counters Stadium Critics

A study commissioned by three construction industry associations aims to counter the prevailing wisdom that large sports stadiums are neighborhood-killers. The report prepared by Hamilton, Rabinovitz & Alschuler, Inc., a management consulting firm, found that stadium projects carefully planned with the goal of anchoring neighborhood development have succeeded, citing recent cases in San Diego, Pittsburgh, and Cleveland.

The Building Trades Employers' Association, the Building and Construction Trades Council, and the New York Building Congress, which commissioned the report, unveiled it at a press conference on Oct. 23, hosted by Lou Coletti, president of the BTEA. "There are stadiums that don't contribute to the economic stability of their communities, and there are also stadiums that do contribute," he said.

The New York proposal will be among the stadium projects that enhance economic development, and will be able to anchor the Hudson Yards redevelopment, said the report's author, John Alschuler, Jr., president of Hamilton Rabinovitz. He said the proposed New York Sports and Conventions Center avoids the pitfalls of big stadium projects not connected to their neighborhoods, some which he notes were never planned for economic development purposes. He cited the isolated projects as ones that sit in "a sea of parking," lack public transit infrastructure, and had little coordinated development to bring parks, hotels, theaters, offices, or housing to the surrounding area.

"Many of them were launched without a specific plan," he said.

The projects chosen for comparison were ones planned for economic development, such as Pittsburgh's Heinz Field, which aimed to revitalize a waterfront district across the river from the city's downtown. "It stimulated the most substantial new development in Pittsburgh in a generation," Alschuler said.

He found similar examples in Cleveland's Jacobs Field and San Diego's PETCO Park. All of those properly aimed for a pedestrian-friendly layout, with redevelopment for mixed uses programmed early on for neighboring plots. San Diego "is literally experiencing a building boom unequivocally triggered by the new stadium," Alschuler said.

All of the stadiums chosen for comparison are for Major League Baseball franchises. The proposed stadium in Manhattan would be the home of the New York Jets football team, and is considerably larger than most baseball parks, with 75,000 seats.

Asked why a stadium in particular is necessary in a redevelopment plan that already envisions major expansion of convention center space, hotels, and other amenities, Alschuler called it "an important link in a chain of destinations." He added that the stadium would encourage redevelopment of the Hudson Yards area more quickly, meeting demand for new housing and office space that he said was widely expected in the region, without letting it slip away to competing jurisdictions.

"People like the energy and excitement of being near an icon," he said. "These are powerful magnets of activity." He added that near PETCO Park, San Diego landlords are commanding the highest rents in the city.

Alschuler also responded to criticism that a stadium on the West Side would create traffic gridlock. He said the plan envisions heavy reliance on public transit, including ferries, buses, and subways. He added that the other cities in the study - which he argued are more reliant than New York on the automobile - have not experienced gridlock conditions around their stadiums. "It's a lot of fear-mongering," he said.

He also cited one of the unexpected benefits in Pittsburgh - a carnival-like walk across the Roberto Clemente Bridge by downtown office workers on nights that the host Pirates have a game. "You see people just streaming across the bridge in the evening," he said.

The report is entitled "Urban Stadia: Why Cities Win the Development Game" and includes a sister document entitled "Urban Stadia Case Studies." Contact Colin Miner at 212 575 4545 for more details.

Latest Findings on WTC Collapse Released

A federal agency has released a report detailing the latest findings on the leading collapse sequence for the Twin Towers, destroyed in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The report also provides analysis of first-person interviews of nearly 1,200 individuals, including occupants of the World Trade Center, first responders, and families of victims, as well as an analysis of emergency response and evacuation procedures and actions.

The reports are part of an ongoing study of the World Trade Center disaster being conducted by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, a division of the U.S. Department of Commerce. A summary is available at http://www.nist.gov/public_affairs/releases/wtc_latest_findings_1004.htm.

The findings, presented by the study's lead investigator, Shyam Sunder, are open to revision. The investigation plans to issue a draft final report next month or in January. That report will ultimately recommend improvements in the design, construction, maintenance, and use of buildings, with a focus on high-rises.

Among the key findings released is the identification of leading hypotheses for the collapse of the two World Trade Center towers, including a chronological sequence of major factors such as load redistribution paths and damage scenarios resulting from aircraft impact and the subsequent fires. The findings also delve into the time delay between the collapses, with one tower standing for 56 minutes, and the other for 103 minutes. The findings attribute the discrepancy to several factors, including different aircraft impact patterns, varying exposure of core columns to heat depending on whether fireproofing held firm, and the structures' ability to redistribute loads as core columns shortened.

The findings also cover post-impact capabilities of the towers, study the roles of core column shortening and fireproofing in detail, and provide analysis of evacuation challenges and procedures. Sunder's full presentation is at http://wtc.nist.gov/media/NCSTACWTCStatusFINAL101904WEB2.pdf.