U.S. Postal Service

An addendum to our article earlier this week on the never-ending Moynihan Station saga: The concept of converting the Farley Post Office into a rail station is widely viewed as belonging to the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, its most persistent advocate from the early 1990s until his death in 2003. But the history goes back a bit further, and started as a partnership between the U.S. Postal Service and Amtrak, both of which stood to gain from a redevelopment of Farley.

Two of the major forces behind the plan's genesis: Donald Pross, who served as Amtrak’s director of real estate and development until 1995, and Dennis Wamsley, who ran the Postal Service’s asset management division.

Amtrak, eager to have a more presentable flagship station, was looking at options of how to improve Penn Station in the late 1980s and early 1990s, according to Mr. Pross.

Around the same time, a postal service executive was heading up a program known as asset management for the agency, finding ways to take existing properties, add other uses, and bring in some new money.  read more »

• The Upper East Side zip code 10021 is getting chopped up three different ways by the U.S. Postal Service. Something tells us the two new codes will become just as adverse to Aby Rosen as the original one.
[NY Sun]
• The Shake Shack opened two days early. Take that, lingering winter!
[Eater]
• Daily Reminder That More Than 6 Million New Yorkers Don't Put Up With High Costs of Manhattan Housing: Out in Flushing, Queens, a five-bedroom Colonial with a five-car driveway and a pool recently sold for $620,000. The median sales price for a one-bedroom apartment in Manhattan was $649,000 in the fourth quarter of 2006, according to Miller Samuel.
[OuterB]
• The Real Deal's hosting its third annual New Development Forum on Tuesday night at Lincoln Center. You don't have tickets? God, you're pathetic.
[Real Deal] - Tom Acitelli
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The Pataki administration failed to hold onto the Farley Post Office in the last moments of 2006, but negotiations are continuing, this time under Governor Spitzer's purview. In late December, Charles Gargano, then-chairman of the Empire State Development Corporation, announced a last-minute blitz to renew the option that the state had to buy the building as part of its Moynihan Station conversion.

Robert Anderson, a spokesman for the United States Postal Service, said no agreement had been reached by the Dec. 31 expiration date, but that there were no plans to try to sell the building to anyone else.

- Matthew Schuerman

He did it! Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver has put off a decision on Moynihan Station for another month.

We tackled this issue last week, and expect it could go on in this cat-and-mouse way until 1) Madison Square Garden makes a deal, 2) Silver and Charles Gargano, the Governor's economic development chief, get tired of the game, or 3) Spitzer gets inaugurated.

The Public Authorities Control Board was supposed to vote on the renovation of the Farley Post Office in west Midtown this afternoon, but alas! State Comptroller Alan Hevesi raised more questions in a last-minute letter. Gargano contends his staff has already answered them, and to prove it, made public the response by the subsidiary overseeing the project.  read more »

Full ESDC response after the jump.

-Matthew Schuerman

The Villager breaks it down for us today on the planned 26-story N.Y.U. dorm at the site of the former St. Ann's Church at 124 East 12th Street. (The story is not yet online.) According to the paper, a coalition of local residents and political clubs is suing the developer, Hudson Companies, which bought the air rights for the project for $7.7. million from the nearby Cooper Station Post Office.

While suing a developer to stop a project is nothing out of the ordinary in this city, the reasons for the lawsuit are: Apparently, federal properties are exempt from city zoning. The lawsuit argues that because of this, the city has no way to regulate the air rights from the Cooper Station. Basically, if the project goes on, the Cooper Station can sell its air rights once again, even though they've previously been sold.
From The Villager:

David Satnick, attorney for Hudson Companies, spoke against the injunction and said the agreement between the Postal Service and Hudson Companies insured the Postal Service had, in effect, sold its air rights to the developer and relinquished any future right to build over its property.

But did the USPS relinquish its right to sell even more air rights? Interesting question. State Supreme Court Justice Edward H. Lehner should rule on it--or refer it to administrative review--soon.

-Matthew Grace

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