Thumbs up. (Morphosis)

The public review process known as ULURP, through which most every large-scale development in the city must pass, is rarely an easy one. New York created the NIMBY, and ULURP is about the only way Joe Public can even pretend to influence such projects as Columbia or NYU's new campuses, the Hudson Yards redevelopment, Riverside South, the Kingsbridge Armory, Chelsea Market... the list of contentious projects goes on and on. A better acronym for the Uniform Land-use Review Process might well be DIVISIVE.

That is what makes CornellNYC, the upstate university's Roosevelt Island tech campus, such an interesting anomaly. After beating out Stanford in a breathless deathmatch for Mayor Bloomberg's blessing to build the campus, the project has so far sailed through ULURP with nary a protest. Back in December, the campus was approved by the local community board (typically a bastion of browbeating), and now Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer gave the new campus his enthusiastic thumbs up.

"I am proud today to announce my recommendation for conditional approval of the Cornell NYC Tech, which will help integrate this important economic development project with the local community,” Mr. Stringer said in a statement. “I believe the modifications agreed to today will bring this proposal further in line with sound planning and community preferences.”

His conditions are strikingly limited. Rather than asking for a reduction in the size of the buildings or promises of affordable housing or partnerships with local kindergarteners, Mr. Stringer is requesting a number of transportation tweaks and construction mitigation measures. From his announcement:

Mitigate construction by actively pursuing barging, and agreeing that if it is not feasible, protocols will be developed to limit noisy deliveries; to have independent monitoring and air quality monitoring through demolition and excavation; and pursue a construction remediation plan for potential soil contaminants;

Increase Red Bus service on the island through construction, develop programs to encourage its employees to use mass transit; and study pedestrian access improvements to the Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge;

Ensure the proposed open space on the campus remains open until 10 PM, cannot have private café seating, and its design will be informed by a new community advisory committee;

Continue to work on potential parking impacts, conduct a study of potential parking impacts from the hotel and corporate co-location building, create a new certification process to evaluate parking impacts if no parking is created,

Commit that all new laboratories will comply with all performance standards outlined in the zoning resolution for M1 zoning districts to minimize impact on surrounding residents.

One of the reasons the project has met so little conflict is it is actually expected by locals and planners to have less of an impact, not more, than the hotel that is already on the south end of the island. (Techies are far more likely to ride the subway than nurses coming in from the Bronx or Long Island.) Also, the project is green, both in terms of sustainable development and in opening up the southern portion of the island with generous public space.

"Borough President Stringer has been a true leader in supporting and guiding the growth of New York's tech sector and we're extremely grateful for his support of Cornell Tech," Cornell President David Skorton said. "Cornell Tech will help drive economic development in New York for years to come, but we know the campus will only be a success if we are good neighbors."

Affordable or not affordable, that is the question. (Durst/Fetner)

Tomorrow, Durst/Fetner will go before the Zoning and Franchise Subcommittee of the City Council, one of the final stops in the months-long public approval process for the developer's angular apartment building at the western edge of 57th Street. Councilwoman Gale Brewer has sent a letter to the developer outlining her demands ahead of the hearing. They largely follow concerns she has had from the start, namely the affordability of the project, community space and an enticing streetscape for the project.

The development, designed by Danish wunderkind Bjarke Ingels and his firm BIG, has drawn international attention for its unusual design, but lingering issues continue to anger the community, including Ms. Brewer. Last month, the project was approved by the City Planning Commission after some minor modifications.

The biggest remaining issue is clearly permanent affordability for the 20 percent of the project's 753 units that are to be set aside for low- and moderate-income residents. "It has been my strong preference that affordable units be designated as permanently affordable," Ms. Brewer writes. "Without permanently affordable units, the city would not be able to maintain its mixed-income residential character."

Currently, the affordability mandate is set to expire after 35 years because the Durst/Fetner does not own the land but instead has a 99-year lease on it from a family whose descendants now number more than a hundred, making negotiations very difficult. To extend affordability beyond 35 years, the developers argue, would be to risk the project's future.

Jordan Barwotiz, a spokesman for the developer, said, without getting into specifics, that the firm is hopeful it can can reach a deal at the council to get the project approved. "We look forward to working with Councilmember Brewer and her colleagues to make the best project possible," he said.

Here is the full letter.

A tweaked north side for Durst/Fetner's 625 West 57th Street. (Durst/Fetner)

Big, pointy apartments. (Durst/Fetner)

When Douglas Durst began deciding, yet again, what to do with the almost block-long property he owns at 57th Street and the Hudson River, City Planning Commissioner Amanda Burden urged the developer to think big. A high-tech data center, a school and a hotel had all fallen through, so Mr. Durst had fallen back on that most reliable form of New York City development: housing.

Ms. Burden wanted something iconic, especially for a project on such a prominent street at such a prominent location right on the waterfront. With Hudson River Park right there, it ought to be iconic. Mr. Durst delivered something BIG indeed, hiring the Danish wunderkinds at Bjarke Ingles Group to design his project.

Yesterday, Ms. Burden got to put her official stamp on the project, when she and the rest of the City Planning Commission approved Durst/Fetner’s BIG pyramid. It was the second-to-last step in the arduous months-long public review process, in many ways made all the easier by a dynamic design that has made this arguably the most unusual apartment building in the city.

"Our approval will facilitate development of a significant new building with a distinctive pyramid-like shaped design and thoughtful site plan that integrates the full block site into the evolving residential, institutional, and commercial neighborhood surrounding it," Ms. Burden said before voting in favor of the project.

Contained within the striking design are 753 apartments in a building that tapers from CKCKthree stories along the river up to a pinnacle of CKCK38 stories. It has an unusual sloping aspect (technically a tetrahedron, not a pyramid) with a massive courtyard cut into the middle that is almost the site of a football field. The cutout also affords every apartment with an outdoor terrace, a feature that was especially important to Mr. Ingels.

The commission required a few modifications to the project, dealing primarily with how it is experienced from the street. There is a limit on the amount of signage and obstructions that can go in the windows of the retail lining 57th Street and the West Side Highway, to ensure transparency and a sense of activity that does not obscure what is going on inside. The fear is a blank wall would deaden the street life, as has happened ion places like Fourth Avenue in Brooklyn.

The developer has made similar gestures on 58th Street to ensure vibrancy on what is otherwise a block-long stretch of almost blank building. Retail wraps the corners of the building, but otherwise, there is a lobby and a loading dock and little else.

Part of the reason for this is the building is located in the 100-year-flood plane, so the Con Ed substation cannot go in the basement but instead by located above-grade. The utility needs access to the facilities at all times, so they have to be on the street, and cannot go higher up in the building. The developer also argued that there is barely any retail on 58th Street as is, so forcing it into the northern side of the building would be impractical and difficult to lease.

The solution was to establish a retail space within the lobby located in that section of the building, and to also install glass vitrines along the blank parts of the façade that could feature plants or sculptures on a rotating basis, creating a more engaging streetscape.

"It's an important approval, and we're pleased with her support and input," Mr. Durst said in an interview.

Previously, the developer agreed to additional modifications when the project received approvals two months ago from Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer. That included widening the sidewalks and narrowing the driveway between 57th and 58th streets located in the middle of the block at the main entrance to the building. Durst/Fetner will also provide seating and landscaping in the space. The developer also agreed to improve a connection to Hudson River Park at 59th Street, a block north of the development. The connection currently passes under an overpass of West Side Highway, and the developers will work with the city and state departments of transportation to spruce up the space.

"In all, this is an exciting project on a pivotal site that will benefit its occupants, the neighborhood and the city as a whole," Ms. Burden said.

One aspect of the project that has yet to be addressed is how long the affordable units in the building will remain affordable. The development is being built through the city's 80/20 program, which means 20 percent of apartments will be reserved for low- and moderate-income families, while the remaining number will be market rate.

Currently, those units will only be eligible for less well-off families for 35 years. The community board desperately wants permanent affordability, but Durst/Fetner insists it cannot agree to such an arrangement because they do not own the land. The developers themselves are leasing it from a family that has owned the land for more than a century, and is now comprised of some 100 trustees Durst/Fetner must negotiate with about extending the affordability window.

But local Councilwoman Gail Brewer has insisted the developers had better get negotiating, because she is willing to torpedo the project at the City Council—the final step in the public review process, where Ms. Brewer will have almost total say over the project—if her constituents do not get what they want.

Preserving the preservatives. (Jamestown Properties)

For many neighbors of the Chelsea Market, the biggest concern over a massive addition to the market was the shape it would take and thus its impact on the High Line, which the market abuts. Love it or hate it, the High Line had become a major neighborhood amenity, one people did not want to see get any worse with a massive eight-story addition overhanging it.

Developer Jamestown Properties acceded to demands from the City Planning Commission—which oversaw the rezoning that helped preserve the High Line—to rejigger the building, so what kind of concessions could Council Speaker Christine Quinn possibly extract? Especially since she had reportedly waffled on whether or not to beat back the building entirely as she eyes crossing over to the other side of City Hall.

Well, what better way to appease NIMBYs and preservationists than with architectural protections and schools?

Today, the City Council's land-use committee voted in favor of the project, with the stipulation the Jamestown commit not to alter the historic former Nabsico factory below the addition, protecting both the original structure and the alterations made to it over the years to create the new market.

"There have been numerous calls in the neighborhood to save the Chelsea Market, and I agree that the historic nature and food focused market should be saved," Speaker Quinn said in a statement. "That is why the Council will vote today to preserve the iconic neighborhood treasure that is the Chelsea Market. In the original plan, there were no restrictions on what the developer could do to the unique and cherished ground floor retail space dominated by food vendors. The Council’s action permanently protects 75 percent of the current total interior ground floor concourse retail space for food-related uses."

Jamestown will also create a youth technology center within the market to provide education services in tech and media for local Chelsea kids, particularly those from two nearby housing projects.

And in a further paean to over development, the Department of City Planning has agreed to look at altering the zoning in other areas of the neighborhood to ensure appropriate development occurs. The focus will be on the area bounded by 11th and 12th Avenues and will also include 85 and 99 10th Avenue, the South side of West 15th street and the east side of 10th Avenue between 14th and 15th Street.

"At each step in the approval process, Jamestown has worked to improve the plan, and the changes made by Speaker Christine Quinn and the City Council strike a careful balance that offers benefits to the neighborhood and allows the project to proceed," Jamestown COO Michael Philips said.

The neighborhood New York forgot. (Hudson Square Connection)

Trinity Church has controlled vast swaths of Lower Manhattan real estate for more than three centuries, since the Queen of England deeded 215-acres to the church in 1705. Much of that property has been given away or sold off, but the church still controls one pocket of land at the mouth of the Holland Tunnel, known affectionately these days thanks to developers and brokers, as Hudson Square.

Over the years, the neighborhood has been remade repeatedly, from farmland to factories to the heart of the city’s printing district. More recently, it has become a hub of media and tech firms—Saatchi and Saatchi, New York magazine, MTV, the New York Genome Center—but the church wants to take things a step further and create a 24/7 live-work neighborhood, like neighboring Soho and Tribeca.

For the past five years, Trinity has been working on a rezoning of 50 acres spread over some 20 off-the-grid blocks—the area often feels remote cut off from the rest of the city as it is by the Holland Tunnel. On Monday, it officially begins the public review process, as the City Planning Commission is expected to certify Trinity's in-hourse rezoning proposal.

The area is generally bounded by Sixth Avenue on the East, the Hudson River on the West, Houston Street to the north and Canal Street to the south. The rezoning will be slightly smaller than that, but at twice the size of the Hudson Yards development 40 blocks north, and three times as big as Columbia’s new Manhattanville campus further north from there, it is by far the largest private rezoning the Department of City Planning has ever underwritten.

It is also one of the most complex, with contextual zoning elements meant to preserve the neighborhood character; open space provisions meant to foster more plazas and parks in an area that has almost none; plus schools, affordable housing, even plans for dealing with night clubs, of which there are already a few in the area. The idea is to create opportunities for housing without stymieing the businesses that have already taken root.

A spokesman for Trinity declined to discuss the project until it is officially certified.

Some locals have already complained that height limits for new buildings are already too high while developers outside of Trinity express concerns about their ability to build. The area is home to celebrities, among them James Gandolfini, Jennifer Garner and Lou Reed, as well as ignominy in the form of a coming garbage truck garage all those stars hate. Meanwhile, one of the primest development sites, Duarte Square along Canal Street and Sixth Avenue, has already made headlines.

It is the empty lot, once a temporary art park, that was taken over by Occupy Wall Street following their eviction from Zucotti Park. Initially, Trinity was happy to have the guests until they showed hostility toward their hosts, at which point the NYPD forced them out, and the park has remained locked up ever since.

Hopefully the rezoning will prove to be less contentious.

Correction:A previous version of this post misstated the year the Queen deeded the land to the church. It was 1705, not 1773. The Observer regrets the error.

Striking, but affordable? (Durst Fetner)

Durst Fetner is at work on arguably the most dynamic, certainly the least square, apartment building in New York City. Jean-Daniel Noland, chair of Community Board 4’s land-use committee, even cautioned his fellow committee members against overwrought superlatives when they considered the project last night as it entered the first phase of public review.

“We are in a house of worship, so no talk of icons tonight,” he said from behind a long table inside the Actor’s Temple synagogue on West 47th Street. “Only Jehovah can do that.”

Still, his colleagues on the committee could not resist, referring to the building as beautiful, interesting, celebrated, stunning, beautiful, attractive, singular, impressive, beautiful and destination architecture. At the end of the meeting, when a resolution was being drafted to make recommendations to the full board on what conditions it should support the project, James Wallace said, “I think we should go out of our to note the spectacular beauty of this design."

“Now, now, that’s a value judgment, and we just can’t do that,” Mr. Noland said.

“How about striking,” Lee Compton said. “Whatever your opinion, you have to admit it’s a striking building.”

Yet no matter how striking, beautiful or iconic the design, the committee could not surmount one serious issue. Despite effusive praise for Durst Fetner’s legacy, the inclusion of a grocery store, a commitment to public art, and yes, that incomparable design, the fact that the developers had committed to only 35 years of affordability for the below-market-rate apartments it was setting aside within the 740-unit pyramid-shaped struck the committee as an unconscionable act.

“The high-end architecture doesn’t do anything to keep the neighborhood diverse,” Joe Restuccia said. In other words, a façade is just a façade. Permanent affordability is forever.

Durst representatives claimed they could not, for financial and fiduciary reasons, pursue a project with unlimited affordability to it. Much of this has to do with an unusual ground lease on the development site, which belongs to the Smiley family, once one of the city's largest landlords. Now comprised of some 100 trustees, the Smileys present complex, almost impossible negotiation, according to the Dursts, and it would be difficult to go back and negotiate a deal that would facilitate additional affordability. "In a way, it's 150 units of affordable housing or none," Jonathan Drescher, director of major projects, said.

This comment particularly set the committee members off. "We've heard that so many times before, and we just don't buy it," Mr. Restuccia said. "You're going to get what you're going to get, so we have to do what we can to ensure this project serves the community, too."

Mr. Noland emphasized that this was a matter of precedent. "I think our concern is, affordable housing is an important component of this community," he said. "If you only give it a certain number of years, and you change it, we don't think that's good for the community, we don't think that's good for New York." He later emphasized that this could set a precedent whereby other developers would come in and say, well, the Dursts only had 35 years, so why should we do more.

In a way, the firm's reputation was as much of a hindrance as a help. People just expected more.

But it was also a difficult community to be operating in. On the one hand, Hell's Kitchen had benefited from a great deal of affordable housing development in recent decades, but much of it had been built with a sunset similar to the one being discussed by the developer now. "Look at Trump, many of those units aren't affordable anymore, and that is a problem we have to confront," local councilwoman Gail Brewer told The Observer after the meeting.

"What are we creating up here?" Mr. Wallace said. "Trump, Extell, now this. It's turning into an island of luxury."

The only other major concern for the community besides affordable housing was a desire to see more retail along 58th Street, where the developer has place most of its mechanical systems. Questions were also raised specifically about what might occupy a 16,000 square-foot community facility building the Dursts want to build on the street. They have proposed childcare of some sort but have no firm commitments, which the committee said it would like to see by the time the project reaches the full board in September.

Whatever the concerns, there was genuine excitement about the project on both sides. "As many of you know, we have tried to get many projects off the ground here," Helena Durst said before presenting the plan. "In fact, this is the fourth time I've come before you."

Not in our back quad! (GVSHP)

Last Thursday, as has happened every day for going on a century, a couple middle-aged intellectuals gathered around a table in Greenwich Village to discuss the news of the day, which, as has happened every day for going on a century, did not suit them.

“They act like it’s a no-brainer,” Mark Crispin Miller explained of the acquaintances he had made in recent months in his quest to stand up to his employer and landlord, New York University. Just two days prior, a committee of the City Council, part of the monolithic “they” Mr. Crispin Miller was railing against, approved the university’s 2 million-square-foot expansion plan, which would plant four sizable buildings just across the street.

“‘Of course it’s going through,’ they tell you,” he said with disgust. “‘She’s running for mayor, she needs the support of the real estate industry, you moron.’” She would be Christine Quinn, Speaker of the City Council, without whose blessing almost nothing happens there. Her district also happens to be just around the corner, giving her added incentive to take an interest in, and credit for, the project.

“This is a no-bullshit city,” Patrick Deer interjected with his British crack. “Even if we see something’s off from across the street, we’ll barge in and do something about it. There’s an innate sense of justice. Or so I thought. I know there was when I got here.” Mr. Deer has been at NYU since 2002, teaching English.

“It’s amoral, like Mitt Romney,” added Bo Ricobono, an adjunct education professor and Soho lifer active on the community board, which unanimously opposed the expansion.

“You mean immoral,” Mr. Crispin Miller said.

“Not immoral, amoral,” Mr. Ricobono continued. “He has to do what he has to do. In that context, in finance, that’s fine. Well, it’s not fine, but it makes sense, you know what I mean? But in this context, in a public project and a public process, it’s just wrong.”

“You purport to act morally,” Mr. Crispin Miller said, looking up from his empty water glass, toward the ceiling. “That’s what Machiavelli said.”

They were sitting inside the Silver Spurs at the corner of Houston Street and LaGuardia Place, having finished a meal of burgers, the restaurant’s greasy specialty. They had hoped to go to Bruno Bakery for some lighter fare, but it had been overtaken by Spanish tourists—yet another affront.

“I love this university. This was my dream job, and we’re just trying to save the university from itself,” Mr. Deer said.

But really, the argument was academic. Like a student blithely ignoring the class syllabus, the NYU faculty opposed to the plan had left their all work for the very last minute. It had been a convincing argument, the kind that might have swayed the public had it been delivered earlier. But politicians and city planners do not grade on a bell curve. At best, the faculty had gotten a C-, a few concessions and little else.

For the past five years, NYU has been working on its first real master plan. Entitled NYU 2031, it is meant to chart the school’s growth over the next two decades as it expands in the Village and beyond—well beyond. Campuses are already up and running in Abu Dhabi and Singapore, and the biggest yet is planned for Shanghai. It is largely the vision of the university’s current president, John Sexton, the long-time dean of the Law School and former chairman of the New York Fed.

Were his vision for a “global network” lacking projects in New York—which also include the takeover of New York Polytechnic in Brooklyn to form NYU Poly, as well as an expansion of the medical school along First Avenue and a possible campus on Governors Island—his critics would probably be delighted, rather than despondent. As it is, they feel ignored, unloved, suffocated. At least that’s been the case the past few months.

It wasn’t until February that any discernible opposition movement began to form within the university. “NYU Faculty Against the Sexton Plan,” they dubbed themselves.

“We call it the Sexton Plan because it’s his plan, not ours,” Mr. Crispin Miller said. “The university is its professors, not the administration.” He is the opposition’s unofficial ringleader. A professor of media studies, he has round glasses and a buzz cut more befitting a monk than a marine. His books include Boxed In: The Culture of Television, The Bush Dyslexicon and Loser Take All: Election Fraud and The Subversion of Democracy.

The opposition group has galvanized a good portion of the faculty—about 40 percent of whom live on the superblocks NYU wishes to redevelop—against the plan. So far, 37 schools or divisions have passed resolutions opposing the plan, including 27 of 32 in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, the university’s oldest and most influential body.

These include programs that arguably know a thing or two about the university’s current undertaking, namely the Stern Business School, which voted 52-3 against, and the economics department, whose 30 professors were unanimous in their disapproval. “What does it tell you that these guys think this plan is a farce?” Mr. Crispin Miller said. Many of the humanities departments, from Anthropology to Museum Studies to Social and Cultural Analysis, are also opposed. Ditto Chemistry, Mathematics and the Center for Neural Science, among others. “And there are more by the week,” Mr. Crispin Miller said.

If one were to build the perfect coalition to beat back such a plan, this would be the place to do it. Economists, planners, scientists, investigative journalists—Nobel laureates! “I voted against it without reservation,” economics professor Thomas Sargent, who won the Nobel Prize last year for his study of “cause and effect in the macroeconomy,” said in an email. “The vote reflected widespread distrust among faculty members that has been fostered by the central administration’s embarking on various ill-conceived and expensive endeavors without consulting the faculty members for their advice and opinions.”

What more could community activists ask for?

Perhaps a little activity. While the outcry since February has been impressive, and is only growing louder, that was a month after NYU certified its plans with the City Planning Commission, at which point they were basically cast in stone. The proposal was ultimately shorn by the City Council committee last week and goes before the full council Wednesday (basically a rubber-stamp vote), but it remains only 20 percent smaller than originally proposed. Two of the four towers have been reduced in size but otherwise remain. In size, it is a development comparable to two Chrysler Buildings.

Meanwhile, the opposition group did not launch its website until late March, and it came up with its own counter-proposal only last week, the same day the council committee voted through the modified plan—well beyond the moment at which it could have changed anything.

In a similar fight two years ago, Extell Development’s plans for the last parcel of Riverside Center were confronted with four separate alternatives offered up by the community board that ultimately helped alter the shape of that proposal, though none of them overhauled it, either.

Quite a few community board members have complained privately that they wish the faculty had been more publicly involved in the fight. “They make a strong case against this plan, one that could really sway public opinion,” one board member said. “I just wish they had made it a year or two ago.”

The NYU administration deserves a good deal of credit for pacifying the faculty, though reportedly not in good faith. “They would hold these little open houses and say, ‘Oh, this is years away,’” Mr. Crispin Miller said. “When we would confront other faculty about it, they said the same thing. ‘I don’t have to worry about that.’ One of the smartest things NYU ever did was spruce up the gardens and buy a new jungle gym, after years of neglect, as if to say, ‘Look, why would we buy this new jungle gym if we were going to tear it down tomorrow?’”

Barbara Weinstein, one of the university’s distinguished Silver Professors, argues it is wrong to pass judgment on the faculty for its timing. “As with most issues, large numbers of people only got mobilized when specific decisions were looming in the near future,” she said. “How much are you doing to prevent global warming, which threatens life as we know it? I’m guessing not a whole helluva lot, even though the threat is massively greater than that of NYU 2031.”

As with any radical debate taking place, there is far from unanimity of opinion. “I am not opposed to it, nor do I view it as my job to defend it,” one Stern finance professor said, lauding the school’s “careful thought about how to achieve it within the constraints of our urban environment.”

Mitchell Moss, the outspoken urban planning professor and a supporter of the expansion, believes the fight is purely political. “You have a number of faculty who relish getting into political fights,” he said. “For them, this is just an extension of their time in graduate school, in Berkeley or Cambridge. For a lot of faculty members, it’s a necessary distraction from the burden of writing and teaching.”

And there is some truth to that. Animosity against President Sexton has been stirring since his appointment—some faculty wanted an outsider—and has only intensified as he has expanded the student body and the university’s footprint. A number of professors said they foresee a no-confidence vote in the future, and Mr. Crispin Miller made similar overtures toward Ms. Quinn and City Councilwoman Margaret Chin, in whose district the project falls. “There is real talk in the community of a recall,” he warned.

The faculty already has Gibson Dunn on retainer and is preparing a lawsuit challenging the expansion once it is approved. (It cannot be challenged in court until that time, but such efforts have a track record of failure.)

Ms. Chin said the failure of the professors had as much to do with intractability as anything. “They had a very strong position pretty much opposing this, they didn’t want any compromise,” she said. “They just wanted a no, and it was hard to explain to them how we had to work things out with NYU.

“They did not seem to understand the process.”

The views from the ivory tower are pretty good, until some wants to build something bigger next door.

Within the BIG surprise was hidden a smaller one, revealed in planning documents filed when the project was approved two weeks ago, dubbed Development Site 2. Plans call for a 110-unit apartment building that backs onto the pyramid apartments, though it is unlikely it will be built in that form, if at all. Instead, it is a zoning technicality.

“That building is in the same zoning lot, so it has to get rezoned with everything else,” Jordan Barowitz, a Durst spokesman, explained. “For technical reasons, we have to keep it in there, so we decided to make it a residential building, to study the impacts.”

Currently, the building, at the corner of 11th Avenue and 58th Street, is a self-storage facility—a Manhattan Mini Storage, to be exact—with a few years left on its lease. It is one of those former industrial buildings that has been totally bricked up. When the lease comes due, the Durst Organization may extend it or look for an alternative commercial use, but the firm is unlikely to redevelop the plot for housing, according to Mr, Barowitz, at least in the form currently outlined in the rezoning.

This is in part because the proposed nine-story building, which would be built around the existing six-story structure, would block views from the new building as well as one Durst Fetner built five years ago, the Helena, which is in the southeastern corner of the lot, on 57th Street.

“We don’t know what we’re doing with that building yet,” Mr. Barowitz said.

Instead, the firm is proposing the 110-unit structure simply because the city's environmental review requires some accounting of what could go on the site, because both are on the same zoning lot. For technical reasons, Durst Fetner chose an apartment building even though they may or may not actually build one.

As for the rest of the block, the ULURP application reveals an unusually shaped building—called not a pyramid but a hexahedron. It measures 1.1 million square feet, with with 867 apartments, 151 of which are set aside for affordable for families making roughly $40,000 a year. Of the building’s remaining area, 80,000 square feet will be set aside for commercial uses, likely doctor’s offices and other community-focused space, while there will be 62,000 feet of ground floor retail.

A community facilities building of 28,000 square feet is proposed behind the storage facility and next to the Helena, and between those and the BIG building will run a driveway serving the two residential buildings. The project will have 285 parking spaces, more necessary than in some buildings, no doubt, given the nearest subway station is Columbus Circle, four avenues away.

More will be revealed tonight at the land-use hearing of Community Board 4, the fist public meeting for the project as it heads into the grueling seven-month public review process. Previously, the board had expressed mild support for the project, celebrating its design, but there may be some issues surrounding the affordable housing component.

In a statement, Douglas Durst mentioned the potential for the project to play a role in the continued transformation of the west side. "We are pleased that we have reached this important benchmark," he said, "and we look forward to working with the CB 4, City Planning and the City Council on this exciting project."

The old—and in the way—plan. (CPC Resources)

Exactly two years ago tomorrow, the City Council approved a sweeping $1.4 billion redevelopment plan for the Domino Sugar refinery on the Williamsburg waterfront. One of the biggest concerns at the time (of which there were many) was that the grand promise made by developer CPC Resources to make 30 percent of the project's 2,200 units would never be realized.

Nowhere in the zoning resolution was this mandated, even though it was the marquee feature of the 11-acre development, along with promises of waterfront access, top-notch open space and a school. The developer could build no affordable housing, though this would mean a smaller project, or use the city's inclusionary housing program to gain a bonus for bigger buildings in exchange for a promise to make 20 percent of any units affordable. Anything beyond that was a promise, one even CPC Resources did not have to keep. The firm had signed a memorandum of understanding saying it would follow through on this promise, but in no why was it legally binding.

That is why when it was announced last week that Jed Walentas and his Two Trees development company is in contract the Domino site for about $180 million (three-times what CPC had paid for it in 2004, but also less an arduous and contentious public approval process), there were widespread concerns that Mr. Walentas would not live up to the promises of his predecessors. In a recent interview, the developer admitted as much.

"Basically, that analysis is correct," Mr. Walentas told The Observer.

"That MOU was not signed by us and the zoning is what it is," he continued. "But at the same time, I'm not tone deaf. I know there is a lot of interest in affordable housing in the community. If we can reach a broad level of support for more, and it is buildable, that is something we would consider."

Mr. Walentas stressed that he still had no idea what his firm planned to do with the expansive site, which stretches for six blocks on the north side of the Williamsburg Bridge and is best known for its iconic Domino sign and smokestack-topped refinery building, both of which were landmarked in 2007. Mr. Walentas admitted it would be difficult to tamper too much with those two pieces, but the rest of the site remains up for discussion.

Yes, he is willing to take the whole damn thing back through the ULURP process, one of the reasons it is arguably much more valuable than it once was. When the rest of Williamsburg was first rezoned those eight years ago, turning it from a wasteland of warehouses into a wasteland of condos, Domino was to remain as the one major bastion to the area's historic industrial character, a bit of grit and blue collar jobs still on the waterfront. The other small holdout was an area on the northern side of the neighborhood, bordering Greenpoint, where it just so happens Mr. Walentas has just opened one of the city's finest hotels. So the city's dreams did not exactly play out.

Mr. Walentas is willing to keep at it, even if one North Brooklyn development watcher called it "crazy to go back to ULURP." Mr. Walentas sees things differently, and to his credit our source also noted that "if anyone can do it, he can." Mr. Walentas said Two Trees would undertake a study of the entire site into the fall to determine the best course of action.

"To be honest, people probably won't believe this, but we really haven't even begun to develop what we think is the best plan for the site," Mr. Walentas said. "We did our underwriting on the plan that is in place, but we're going to take 4, 6, 8 months to study this and come up with the best course of action. If we come up with something better and build a consensus around it, that's what we'll build. If we conclude the plan that's in place now is optimal, we'll build that plan."

He added that "you don't need the ULURP to make an economic go of this," so if his team were to go that route, it would be a sign of a superior plan.

Having a zoning in place does make negotiations easier, though. "We can try and rezone this, and if it doesn't work, we'll just go back to what we've got," Mr. Walentas said. "It's not like we've got the choice between something or nothing. We've got the choice between what has been proposed and what we might want to do."

He stressed that whatever happens, there will be an intensive community outreach. "We do not even know what they are looking for at this point," Mr. Walentas said. He also pointed out that the project had struggled in part because of the incredibly demanding parameters of the previous plan, which is why Two Trees will be exploring all possible options.

"Regardless of what the deal was with the previous people, it's been several years and nothing's gotten built," Mr. Walentas said. "One of the biggest challenges is to make something happen. I do think affordable housing will be at the top of the list, but there's a wide array of social benefits this project can offer, from schools to open space to community space."

As far as an architect goes, Mr. Walentas said he has not even begun to think about that part of the project and is instead focused on completing the planning. He said he was open to working with multiple designers on the site but also acknowledged that he had met with the project's original designer, Rafael Viñoly.

While the process is daunting, and any reduction in affordability, allowable as it is, will likely ignited a local firestorm, some local machers are looking forward to improving the project and, more importantly, finally having something built.

"The Domino rezoning was never a particularly good deal for the community, even with the promised affordable housing," Ward Dennis, co-chair of Neighbors Allied for Good Growth said in an email. It was substantially larger than prior waterfront zonings, and didn't address key infrastructure issues—transit, transportation and particularly open space."

Perhaps negotiations with Mr. Walentas might help address some of these issues, while others have existed all along, Mr. Dennis concluded. "It's encouraging that this developer is seriously looking at building some of that affordable housing," he said, "but it has been clear all along that nothing was guaranteed, and that anything over 20% (the inclusionary zoning baseline) would be tenuous at best."