Yonkers Waterfront Eyed For $900 Million Project

By JOHN JORDAN

YONKERS, NY— Another major development project is officially on the drawing board in Yonkers and could break ground in about 12 months.

Homes for America Holdings, Inc., has once again come to the city with plans for a $900-million project on the city’s waterfront. The locally based firm originally showed off plans for Point Street Landing in late 2006, but did not go through any approval process as the city was undertaking a master plan for the Alexander Street section of the city, which includes the 14.6-acre former BICC Cable site project.

Homes for America Holdings “informally submitted” its revised plans for Point Street Landing to the Yonkers Community Development Agency on June 25 and then made a public presentation at the Yonkers Riverfront Library in the evening. Daniel D. Tartaglia, senior vice president of development and project manager for Homes for America Holdings, said that the plan has been revised, although the scope of the project pretty much remains the same from the original plan.

The project calls for the development of 1,124 housing units in four high-rise buildings and a number of townhouse units. The four towers would be 33, 26, 39 and 26 stories tall under the preliminary plan now before the city. The 2006 plan called for five towers of 26, 19, 29, 29 and 25 stories. The change in tower configuration was done because the original proposal “impinged on view corridors” of the Hudson River, the Homes for America Holdings executive said. The developer plans to have the buildings in the project designated as Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) by the US Green Building Council. The project is designed by Perkins Eastman of New York City.

“This is the best proposal to get the density we need and to make the project economically viable,” Mr. Tartaglia said. The plan also includes 54,000 square feet of office space, 40,000 square feet of retail space, 142 marina wet slips and 230 marina dry slips and parking for 1,830 vehicles. The plan also calls for the designation of about four acres as accessible public space. The firm has hired Project for Public Space, a non-profit New York City-based company that helps create and sustain public spaces, to work on that component of the venture. Although not officially part of the open space facet of the project, a rooftop park on one of the buildings across from what will be a new Point Street Bridge is also planned. In addition to the 14 acres of waterfront property, Homes for America Holdings also owns approximately 16 acres underwater.

“Point Street Landing still offers a practical, intelligent use of space,” Mr. Tartaglia stressed. “The object is for the space to be successful—for the waterfront to be a dynamic combination of activity. It is designed for everyone—its residents, the surrounding neighborhood, and the community at-large. It is not a private enclave. It maximizes the beautiful view of the Hudson River for the people of Yonkers. At present, they can’t enjoy the view because they cannot access it.”

Point Street Landing’s housing component was originally pegged as strictly condominiums. However, today’s market conditions have caused Homes for America Holdings to take a second look. “Some of the work we have done over the past several months was to look at alternatives to condominium development versus rental development,” Mr. Tartaglia said. “So we are actually looking at both because there are some lenders that won’t look at condominium development.”

“This is a development attuned to the needs of people, communities, and the environment,” Mr. Tartaglia said. “We want to ensure that the Point Street Landing project is ‘smart,’ as imaginative and future-thinking as possible, and that it meets the needs of the City of Yonkers and all of its people. That’s our vision, pure and simple.”

A $30-million remediation program at the site, which began in earnest in 2006, is nearing completion.

This is part of the July 1, 2008 online edition of Construction News.

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