Is the Vanderbilt Yard platform finally coming? Well, MTA reports discussions. Two-phase deck would support six development parcels.

Is development over the Vanderbilt Yard, which requires a platform over two blocks and would support six development sites, finally coming?

Well, signs indicate progress on the long-delayed two-phase platform, according to responses to my queries from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, or MTA. The first block to be developed is Block 1120, bounded by Atlantic Avenue and Pacific Street, and Carlton and Vanderbilt avenues. 

Not only are there railyard tracks, leading to the Atlantic Terminal, there are terra firma "bump" parcels at street level that jut south from Atlantic Avenue, providing space to stage construction and build cellars--and which thus do not require a platform.

First tower percolating?

Developer Greenland Forest City Partners (GFCP) in May 2020 filed initial permits for B5, 700 Atlantic Ave., the first tower over the railyard, just east of Sixth Avenue, and remains in dialogue with the Department of Buildings. As I wrote last month, a permit for foundation work is pending.

It is possible that B5 might be built, in part, simultaneously with the platform, and/or that the platform segment associated with B5 will be built separately from the segment for B6 and B7. 

That said, even progress starting now on one tower and the platform does not mean that the developer would complete the required 876 more affordable units by May 31, 2025, after which it faces fines for $2,000/month for each missing unit. So that deadline may face renegotiation.

The platform

Remember, Greenland told the New York Post on Sept. 30, 2019--in what was at least partly a p.r. strategy--that it would start construction of the platform in 2020.

That never happened, and the developer--dominated by Greenland USA--has been closemouthed.

Why the delay? Is there any impediment? 

In response, the MTA told me that the developer first needed to reconfigure the existing railyard, used to store and service Long Island Rail Road trains, to make way for the platform and overbuild. 

That reconfiguration work is governed by a different contract than the overbuild work. The yard relocation contract is in its final, paperwork stages. (That implies that Greenland was way overoptimistic, or unrealistic/lying, in 2019.)

Meanwhile, the MTA has been working with the developer on the action items under the overbuild contract, including design approval, construction manager approval, and more.

Note that Greenland has said they have selected a contractor, but have not named that contractor--perhaps because the MTA hasn't signed off. It's also unclear how they're expecting to pay for the platform, which should cost at least $200 million. (Will there be a public bailout? If so, that's a case for more public control, as planner Ron Shiffman has argued.)

At least some (all?) of the railyard construction, which also cost at least $200 million, was supported by low-interest loans from immigrant investors under the EB-5 program. 

After initial developer Forest City raised $228 million in an initial round of EB-5 funding, used significantly to pay off land loans, Greenland Forest City raised $249 million, which could be used for multiple purposes including the railyard upgrade

Payment for parcels

As I reported in July 2016, the developer had paid the first of 15 annual installments of approximately $11 million each for Vanderbilt Yard development rights. Those came after an $8 million down payment, in four tranches.

The developer remains current, according to the MTA, which means there have been six payments so far, with the seventh due June 1, 2022.

How many parcels?

Note that those the first three parcels probably need seven--or, at most, eight--payments to unlock development. 

That means that the final three parcels would be jeopardized if payments stop after June 2023, so stay tuned. That's a more complicated, and extensive platform, since it would cover the entire block, between Atlantic and Pacific again, this time between Carlton and Vanderbilt avenues, and would be key to the majority of the project's open space, which relies on transforming demapped Pacific Street.

A Development Parcel Purchase Price is assigned to each Development Parcel, according to the MTA's 6/22/09 Staff Summary, based on the total Air Rights Parcel Purchase price--the full payment--and the proportional zoning square footage design associated with the Development Parcel. 

That Development Parcel is conveyable to Empire State Development, or the developer, only upon payment of the full Development Parcel Purchase Price. 

Given that the payments so far add up to at least one and probably two Development Parcel Purchase Prices--thus unlocking sites for B5 and B6--how many parcels have been conveyed?

Well, that depends on construction of the platform. Once that starts, those conveyances should begin to happen. The MTA says they're talking withe Greenland about that first transfer.