Earlier this year, the Essex Crossing developers announced that they’d decided against creating underground parking as part of the big mixed use project on the former Seward Park urban renewal site. The city’s master plan would have allowed up to 500 spaces, replacing parking that will be lost as a result of the project. Streetsblog sat down with City Council member Margaret Chin to talk about the decision, which she supports in the name of reducing congestion in an area well-served by public transportation. You can watch the interview here:
NYC Replaces a Parking Crater With Parking-Free Housing and Retail from STREETFILMS on Vimeo.
So where will tourist, handicap with cars be able to park. Is this a bate and switch going on by the folks of L&M Development and Donald Capoccia.
There are many visitors from nearby hotels that take advantage of the limited parking spaces available. By eliminating the parking options, less tourism will stay in our great lower east side area. This action is contradicting the development, which is being done to revamp LES to attract more tourist… doesn’t make sense. This decision should be most definitely reconsidered.
You seriously think people only visit the LES because of these parking lots? Or that having fewer desolate parking lots and, instead, more attractions, will decrease the amount of people visiting the area? C’mon…
“Let them take the subway.”
She’s not this way with every property owner.
What about the nearby public housing residents? Aren’t any of those longtime residents car owners? I’m pretty sure my brother’s former coworker’s family has a car and when my father had to drop off chicken soup for the birth of his new niece, parking was already a horror down there and my mother and I had to wait in the car for more than an hour.
That BID guy in Chinatown was complaining about civil servants needing to use the street parking all day in Chinatown so losing these spaces will have an effect as well because I used to know a lot of guys who worked in the govt agencies who walked pretty far to park their cars affordably.
Many people in the Grand Street coops have cars and park on the streets nearby. That situation will only get more difficult with new building I’m sure. I support the lack of new parking for the most part. A pay parking facility would perhaps have been an interesting idea, but we don’t need more people driving down here.