Metro-North Commuter Railroad Company

The city is planning to finance a set of garages and lots that would add almost 3,000 more parking spaces near Yankee Stadium even though the new ballpark is going to seat 6,000 fewer patrons than the current one.

A hearing Thursday before the Industrial Development Agency, an arm of city government, drew a limited but earnest response from watchdog groups and community organizations, asserting that the more parking spaces you build, the more people will drive. They argued that instead of using public funds to encourage driving, the money should be put toward a proposed Metro-North station that reportedly needs another $35 million to come into being.

The I.D.A. will vote on whether to authorize $190 million in tax-exempt bonds for the project in May or June, according to a spokeswoman. The agency's analysis shows that the city will spend $20 million to reconstruct parkland on top of the garages and will lose another $2 million in forgone taxes on the bonds, which will be tax-free.

Eventually, the city will make more than double its money back through new taxes, lease payments and shared revenues, though it will do so over a 43-year period, the I.D.A. said; it would not release the assumptions for the revenue numbers.  read more »

It always seemed like a funny trick to get support for the new Yankee Stadium: build a new Metro North station nearby, not with the Yankees' money, mind you, but with the public's. Unfortunately, the $45 million that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority had set aside for the project, which was supposed to start this spring, is not nearly enough.

Try $80 million instead.

All of which, Real Estate Weekly reports in its March 21 issue (available in print only), led Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrión to look for another way to pay for it. Wait, how about asking the Yankees to pitch in? No, Mr. Carrión has another idea.

He wants to let a developer build "an extensive mixed-use development" on top of the station in return for paying for the station's construction.

Bidder up!

- Matthew Schuerman

• Is blocking the Starrett City sale fair?
[WSJ]
• Solving size puzzle in an Upper West Side studio.
[NY Times]
• Finding New York apartment share for under $1,000.
[NY Times]
• How safe is your city home against storms?
[NY Times]
• Red Hook's "fan club has a growing membership."
[NY Times]
• Poughkeepsie fastest-growing Metro-North station.
[NY Times]
• Americans choosing Israel for second homes.
[NY Times]
• Rare condos draw attention on the East End.
[NY Times]
• New Fifth on Park starts rising in Harlem.
[NY Times]
• Laminated windows can keep out the city din.
[NY Times]
• What're rules on when a co-op deal has to close?
[NY Times]
• Mortgage industry's woes "troubling" for Wall Street.
[NY Times]
• UBS creates "brand recall" with redesigned space.
[NY Times]
• Real-estate signs brouhaha in Riverdale.
[NY Times]
• Final bash of The Roxy.
[NY Times]
• Madonna hunting for Manhattan home.
[NY Post]
• Trouble still ahead for national housing market.
[NY Post]
• More city eateries closing from failed inspections.
[NY Post]
• Sunnyside Gardens battle over landmarks designation.
[NY Post]
• City mulls closure of part of lower Broadway.
[NY Sun]

Did we miss any New York City real estate news this morning? Please send along tips and links.

• 0 comments

Starting at 8:30 a.m. NYC public high school teachers discuss the Holocaust and pedagogy at the Simon Wiesenthal Center/NY Tolerance Center in Manhattan.

At 9:30 a.m., MTA committee meetings are held on Madison Avenue to discuss the Metro-North Railroad.

At 10:30 a.m., education advocates release a report titled "NYC Middle Grade Schools: Platforms for Success or Pathways to Failure?" on the Tweed Courthouse steps.

Starting at 1:30 p.m., the Public Service Commission holds a public hearing on Oriental Boulevard in Brooklyn about a proposal to acquire KeySpan Corp.

At 2 p.m., Hillary Clinton, Evan Bayh, and John McHugh discuss their trip to Iraq and Afghanistan.

At 5 p.m., Mayor Bloomberg speaks at the opening of Doug Aitken: Sleepwalkers, at the Museum of Modern Art.

Also at 5 p.m., Manhattan's Community Board 1 holds a special executive session before a regular monthly meeting on Beekman Street.

At 7 p.m., Council Speaker Christine Quinn has a "Community Conversation" at NYU Medical Center on First Avenue.

And starting at 7 p.m., NYU School of Law hosts a discussion about domestic spying on West 3rd Street.

-- Azi Paybarah

Wrong Side Of the Tracks   To the Editor:    read more »

Wrong Side Of the Tracks   To the Editor:    read more »

Wrong Side Of the Tracks   To the Editor:    read more »

Happy Halloween!

Eliot Spitzer will campaign with Andrea Stewart-Cousins at the Yonkers Metro North train station.

John Edwards discusses U.S.-China relations at the Asia Society.

AARP holds an election issues forum for Hispanic voters at the James Monroe Senior Center in the Bronx.

Christine Quinn and Council Members visit the Hebrew Home at Riverdale.

A rally protesting rent increases for former homeless people with AIDS living in supportive housing will be held outside of the Governor's New York office.

Latino immigrants protest Hillary Clinton's support for a fence along the U.S.-Mexico border in front of her New York offices.

New York State Public Employees Federation endorses Staten Island Assembly candidate Janele Hyer-Spencer at the South Beach Psychiatric Center.

Queens Latino legislators call for an investigation of disenfranchised voters on the steps of City Hall.

Hillary Clinton addresses the Council on Foreign Relations.

Chuck Schumer joins Steve Harrison, Janele Hyer-Spencer, and State Senate candidate Matthew Titone for a Democratic solidarity press conference near the Verrazano Bridge in Staten Island.

The Suffolk County GOP endorses Christopher Callaghan outside of the New York State Office Building in Hauppauge.

—Nicole Brydson

The Governor's show today appears to have moved Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver little. Silver has come up with a new reason to put off approval of the Moynihan Station plan, which his press office put out today:

"It has become increasingly difficult to understand the lack of an explanation as to why we are not moving ahead with the broader plan for Moynihan Station. Under the proposal for phase one presented to the Assembly for approval, only commuters from out of state would benefit from a new facility. We need to move ahead with phase two in order to ensure that Long Island Rail Road, Metro-North, Amtrak and subway riders are all afforded an updated, safe and modern transportation facility. As the proposal stands now, with all the transportation benefits going to non-New Yorkers, I cannot support it."

Silver's Press Secretary Skip Carrier said the Governor's staff will provide one last briefing at 11 a.m. tomorrow in advance of the 2 p.m. meeting of the Public Authorities Control Board.

-Matthew Schuerman

Joyce Purnick notes today (subscription required) how the last-minute endorsement by Mayor and Governor for a Yankee Metro-North station (paid for by M.T.A. taxpayers and riders) was all that was needed to convince some pols to vote yes for Yankee Stadium. But wasn't that a card Bloomberg and Pataki had been keeping up their sleeve all along until the opportune moment?

At times, that card did get shown, but no one remembers.

Last June in the Daily News, just before the official unveiling, T.J. Quinn, citing unnamed sources, reported:

The state and city will spend up to $300 million to replace and enhance park land that will be lost to the new site, build new parking structures, extend the subway platform, build a Metro-North station and build up the Bronx waterfront. (Archive fee.)

Two weeks later, the News reported that the new station, along with the subway improvements, would cost $90 million. (Another archive fee.) Now, Yankee fan Adolfo Carrion is saying the Metro-North station would cost but $30-40 million. Ah, thank goodness for deflation.

-Matthew Schuerman UPDATE: The Metro-North station was actually part of the Borough President's plan for the area. The final environmental impact statement for the stadium indicates the Mayor supported the idea back in February when it came out :

[A]lthough a new Metro-North station is not part of the proposed project, the City and the Yankees support the construction of the proposed Metro-North Yankee Stadium station, and the proposed project has been developed so as not to preclude the future construction of a new station. (p. 541)

The new Yankee stadium plan passed the City Council subcommittee (3-0) and committee (22-1) today and is awaiting near unanimous approval before the full body this afternoon. Council Member Tony Avella voted 'aye,' changing his mind from when he talked with us Monday for the article in today's paper. It was the Metro-North station that made him do it, he said.

Charles Barron voted nay; Helen Foster will also oppose it before the full Council but she is not on Land Use.

The community benefits agreement was not, Committee Chairwoman Melinda Katz kept reminding members, the issue on the floor, and yet it had a way of creeping into people's endorsements of the project. After the vote, Maria Baez, the "dean" of the Bronx delegation, told reporters that the agreement had not been signed yet but was complete. Final terms: The Yankees will contribute $1.2 million a year (up from $700,000) for nonprofit organizations and for park maintenance, a certain percentage of which must be in Community Board 4; $1 million a year for four years for a job training and apprenticeship program; and 15,000 game tickets to borough residents.

So who will sign this thing, and when? Baez told us Yankees President Randy Levine and Borough President Adolfo Carrion along with some council members, hopefully before the final vote this afternoon. We'd be surprised: in the past, these C.B.A.'s have avoided having any officials' signatures to make clear they are outside the city's land use process.

Outside, as in, being hashed out outside the City Council chambers and downstairs in the private conference room.

-Matthew Schuerman

Governor Pataki and Mayor Bloomberg and every other elected official who could squeeze inside a two-page press release just came out in support of a Metro-North station at the proposed new Yankee Stadium site. Tough call. We wonder what took these guys so long to, um, get on board.

Apparently a deadline. Tomorrow the City Council members will vote on the stadium, though, according to the Daily News, they don't need any more reason to say yes.

The M.T.A. board will still have to approve it, though with the Governor and Mayor behind it they probably will. No word on how much it will cost--$5 million for design alone--but it is quite clear who will be paying: not the Yankees, but the transit agency, and the riders and taxpayers who support it.

--Matthew Schuerman

The New York City subway system isn’t for sissies, as a Jan. 3 incident proved.  read more »

The New York City subway system isn’t for sissies, as a Jan. 3 incident proved.  read more »

I almost thought of calling these things "The Walk-Through." Guess not.

- Jonathan Miller on the Times' front page story on housing costs. And on the SmartMoney "Don't Buy the Bubble Talk" article, he has this to say: "Are we sure that there has to be an extreme conclusion to all of this, or does it simply make for better reading?" UPDATE: More bubble-reading, via The Walk-Through, in this study of the real-estate market. Thesis: Ceci n'est pas un bubble.

- Real-estate blogosphere apoplectic over Brownstoner's Talk of the Town debut yesterday. (We loved it over here.)

- Curbed reports that coop shareholders at Castle Village--the complex perched above the West Side Highway retaining wall that collapsed in the Spring--are beiung made to come up with anywhere from $12,000 to about $20,000 each in clean-up costs.

- Meanwhile, Real Estate Journal jumps on the Suze Orman bandwagon. Cheap mortgages suck!  read more »

- And: Slow progress on Harlem Park, the mixed-use megalith planned for a 2006 opening near the 125th Street Metro North station.

- Tom McGeveran

So what is a New York City Democrat supposed to do?  read more »

So what is a New York City Democrat supposed to do?    read more »

I'm tired of dinner.Is anybody else getting the feeling the Swedes are up to something?  read more »

In a development that could boost support for keeping the Yankees in the Bronx, Gov.  read more »