Midtown East

Midtown East

A Conversation with Majora Carter; learn how you can help green the ghetto and encourage sustainable development

Posted by AndreaHenderson on February 15, 2010 - 1:30am

Date/Time:

February 23, 2010 - 6:00pm - 8:30pm

MCG is a pioneering consulting company that works to unlock the potential of places. MCG is involved in creating job opportunities and economic growth through climate-adaptation strategies, green jobs training & placement systems, and intensive urban-agriculture projects. Led by one of the green movements premiere thought leaders, MCG is looking for collaborators, clients, and investors.

Born, raised, and continuing to live in the South Bronx, Majora believes you shouldn’t have to move out of your neighborhood to live in a better one, and that this notion has environmental and economic implications that span the globe.

In 2001, after successfully shifting the Giuliani administration’s plans from more municipal waste handling to positive economic development, she founded the non-profit environmental justice solutions corporation, Sustainable South Bronx (SSBx). Her first major project was writing a $1.25M Federal Transportation planning grant for the South Bronx Greenway with 11 miles of alternative transport, local economic development, low-impact storm-water management, and recreational space. This led to the first new South Bronx water front park in over 60 years.

Tags: Midtown East, Columbia Business School, Green Development, Green Jobs, greening the ghetto, poverty alleviation, Sustainable Development

Carbon Offset Firm Inks Sublease at 10 East 40th Street

Tue

Aug

by Stephen Del Percio

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The CarbonNeutral Company, whose recent local client roster includes Bruce Ratner's star-crossed New Jersey Nets, recently moved its North American regional headquarters into a new office suite on the 31st floor of the Mercantile Building at 10 East 40th Street between Fifth and Madison. The UK-based firm assists clients in carbon management and reduction strategies, including the purchase of carbon offsets; it has worked on over 200 projects in 6 continents since its founding in the early 1990s.

CarbonNeutral's new 5000-square-foot space at the Mercantile Building is more than double the size of its old home at 527 Madison Avenue. Asking rents for the space were $40 per square foot; the Lansco Corporation represented CarbonNeutral and Newmark Knight Frank the sublessor. The art deco Mercantile Building was built in 1929 and designed by Ludlow & Peabody; at the time, it was the 4th tallest building in the world. The 48-story tower offers 350,000 square feet of office and mixed-use space and is also home to the Moroccan consulate.

515 Madison Avenue Earns East Midtown Partnership's 2009 Building of the Year Award

Tue

Jul

by Stephen Del Percio

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At its annual meeting back on June 18, the East Midtown Partnership presented 515 Madison Avenue with its 2009 Building of the Year award. As you'll recall, the tower recently underwent a $5 million renovation and continues to pursue a LEED-EBOM rating from USGBC. The 42-story neo-classical building is owed by Newmark Knight Frank chair Jeffrey Gural and was built in 1931 from an original design by J.E.R. Carpenter. Rosen Johnson Architects executed the renovation project, which included an expansion and upgrades to the building's lobby. The porte-cochere (carriage door) Madison Avenue entrance was redesigned to emphasize the building's signage by allowing natural light to penetrate its canopy. Gural is also pursuing LEED-CI certification for 515 Madison's 13th and 14th floors, where green design features include recycled-content carpets, lighting occupancy sensors, and dual-flush toilets. The East Midtown Partnership acknowledged 515 Madison's "extensive renovation designed to make it an environmentally-friendly 'green' building, and increased occupancy in the process;" we recently noted a trio of leases that were finalized at the building.

599 Lexington Ave

515 Madison Avenue Pursues LEED-EB, Inks Trio of Tenants

Wed

Jun

by Stephen Del Percio

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Thanks, perhaps, to a $5 million facelift and LEED-EBOM application, 515 Madison Avenue (at East 53rd Street) has been a recent bright spot in an otherwise unspectacular Manhattan commercial real estate market thus far in 2009. Recently, three deals were finalized at the 42-story tower: (1) a 22,300-square-foot, 15-year lease at $65 per square foot on the building's fourth and fifth floors for the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center; (2) a 9100-square-foot, 10-year lease for communications company Kreab & Gavin Anderson Worldwide, which will take the entire 18th floor at $65 per square foot; and (3) 1900 square feet to Hamilton Investment Funds over five years for half of the tower's 27th floor at $67 per square foot. Newmark Knight Frank chair Jeffrey Gural owns the neo-classical 515 Madison, which was built in 1931 and originally designed by J.E.R. Carpenter. Gural retained Rosen Johnson Architects in connection with the building's renovation project, which included an expansion and upgrades to the building's lobby.

Gotham's First Green Pizzeria to Open Ovens at 132 East 56th Street

Fri

May

by Stephen Del Percio

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Owner-chef Edward Sylvia is planning on transforming a former Quiznos space at 132 East 56th Street (between Lexington and Park Avenues) into New York City's first green pizza parlor. Pizza by Certé should be open for business sometime this fall and offer locally-sourced ingredients, recyclable boxes, biodegradable utensils, and even thyme and basil grown within the 1200-square-foot restaurant itself.

Pizza by Certé intends to seek an unspecified level of LEED certification and will incorporate green design features ranging from a graywater system to efficient baking ovens that will capture excess heat and turn it into electricity. Hard construction costs should run Mr. Sylvia around $600,000.00- which is about double the price tag for the same size pizzeria without any green features- but Mr. Sylvia tells Crain's that he expects to recoup the green building premium thanks to energy and other cost savings.

Tenants to Swim in Gold at Macklowe's 510 Madison Avenue

Wed

Jan

by Stephen Del Percio

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Other pieces of sustainable architecture that have been unveiled in Manhattan to date may be a bit more dramatic, but we've been remiss in not mentioning Macklowe Properties' 510 Madison Avenue previously. The 30-story project at 53rd Street was designed by SCLE Architects with collaboration from Moed de Armas & Shannon. Each floor plate in the building is 15,000 square feet or smaller and the speculative tower is thus being marketed at high-end tenants capable of occupying an entire floor of space. Trusses on the sixth floor transfer the structural load to three interior base columns, which allows for the type of column-free tower floors that Macklowe's target investment firm tenants crave. In fact, back in December Macklowe secured its first lease with investment firm Jay Goldman & Company (which will relocate from the 48th floor of the Carnegie Hall Tower) at $150 per square foot for an undetermined, 11,500-square-foot mid-rise floor.