FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM MARСH 12, 2020 • THE QUEENS COURIER 21
City releases long-term Sunnyside Yard Master Plan
BY BILL PARRY
bparry@schnepsmedia.com
@QNS
Th e city and Amtrak released
the long-awaited Sunnyside Yard
Master Plan Tuesday, a detailed
framework on building new
public transit fi rst and making
all housing aff ordable, with a
focus on New Yorkers earning
less than $50,000 a year. Th e
ambitious project would deck
over a large portion of the 180
acres of active rail yard in order
to build a small city on top of it.
Th is plan is very diff erent
from the $2.6 million feasibility
study that was released by the
city’s Economic Development
Corporation in Feb. 2017, which
called for up to 24,000 units of
housing in residential towers as
tall as 69 stories with an overall
cost of $16 to $19 billion.
“Aft er over a year of extensive
community engagements
and scores of conversation with
a wide range of stakeholders, we
developed a thoughtful framework
to guide development
at Sunnyside Yard for generations
to come,” Deputy Mayor
for Housing and Economic
Development Vicki Been said.
“We benefi ted enormously from
those discussions, and the master
plan responds to the feedback
by putting neighborhood
needs for transit, aff ordable
housing and open space fi rst, to
ensure that future development
is responsible, inclusive and fair.”
Th e master plan calls for the
creation 100 percent aff ordable
housing with 12,000 homes, 60
acres of new open space, equitable
home ownership opportunities,
the long-sought Sunnyside
Station and necessary infrastructure
and other public amenities
on a publicly controlled site
equal in size to Roosevelt Island
or six times the size of Hudson
Yards.
“What we are doing is creating
public land like Battery Park
City that would support buildings,”
Director of Sunnyside Yard
Adam Grossman Meagher said.
“It’s a refl ection of the public
process we were engaged in and
the urgent need for aff ordable
housing.”
Th e master plan accommodates
approximately 12,000
aff ordable homes, more than
Stuyvesant Town and Peter
Cooper Village combined. All
of the homes will be aff ordable
and restricted to incomes
that refl ect the most pressing
needs of Queens, with 6,000
units for very low-income New
Yorkers. All rental units will be
rent-stabilized, according to the
NYCEDC.
Th e remaining 6,000 homes
would create aff ordable homeownership
opportunities to help
families build wealth through a
21st-century fi nancing mechanism
based upon the Mitchell-
Lama Housing Program, which
for decades has created opportunity
for many New Yorkers.
Th e cost of the deck will be
around $14.4 billion dollars.
Grossman Meagher would not
speculate on the exact cost of
the residential component other
than to say it would be “regular
building costs that you see in
New York City these days,” but
he said the “scale of the building
will make sense.”
Th e towers close to Long Island
City would be 30 to 50 stories
high and residential buildings
approaching Sunnyside Gardens
would be mid-rise to low-rise.
Before the decking and developing
proceed, infrastructure
such as the Sunnyside Station
will come fi rst.
“Th at’s something communities
in western Queens and their
elected offi cials have been calling
for and that’s why we decided to
make that a priority,” Grossman
Meagher said. “We believe the
station should come fi rst. It will
be built at the western edge of
the yard on the east side of the
Queens Boulevard Bridge and it
will be served by the Long Island
Rail Road and eventually Metro-
North when service begins to
Penn Station. New Jersey Transit
and Amtrak could also factor in
connecting western Queens to
every part of the greater New
York City region and major cities
of the northeast.”
Congresswoman Carolyn
Maloney has been an advocate
for years for a transit hub near
the East Side Access project.
“I am encouraged that the
Master Plan includes the
Sunnyside Station in its fi rst
phase,” Maloney said.
Th ere is also planning for a
new Rapid Bus Line connecting
Queens with Midtown
Manhattan, as well as the potential
for a future new Queens
subway line to connect New
Yorkers with existing and emerging
economic centers, fueling job
growth and access to opportunity,
Courtesy of NYCEDC
according the NYCEDC.
“It is exciting to see the
release of this framework plan
for Sunnyside Yard, the largest
and best located opportunity
to holistically address both the
existing community needs and
future growth in western Queens
and the city,” LIC Partnership
President Elizabeth Lusskin,
co-chair of the Sunnyside Yard
Steering Committee, said. “Th e
preliminary framework released
today responds to those priorities,
proposing a new rail hub
to support a fast growing western
Queens and the area’s transit
network, more than 60 acres
of new public open space, and
100 percent aff ordable housing,
a range of jobs and resilient planning.
As we move into the next
phase of the project, community
input will continue to be the key
to ensuring Sunnyside Yard lives
up to its potential and meets the
diverse and growing needs of
the people and businesses based
here.”
Maloney will be watching how
the planning process proceeds.
“While I am initially encouraged
by the proposal for the
Sunnyside Yard Master Plan governance
entity, it is necessary
that this continues to be a community
driven process and I will
not support plans that abandon
this approach,” Maloney said. “I
will continue to be a fi erce advocate
for an open dialogue that
ensures none of our neighborhood’s
voices are left out.”
Renderings courtesy of PAU
link
/WWW.QNS.COM
link
