Push Begins for Community and Sports Center on City-Owned Seaport Site

The pier platform of the former New Market Building, a valuable piece of city-owned riverfront property. The city says it will not consider potential uses for the site until there is a design for the Seaport Coastal Resiliency project. Photo: Carl Glassman/Tribeca Trib 

A community center and field house in the Seaport, with dramatic river views. Could it happen?

Community Board 1 and a group of local activists are now looking to make that long wished-for public facility on Lower Manhattan’s east side more than a dream.

Last month CB1 lent its support to an initiative by the South Street Seaport Coalition [1] to put a three-story, nearly 60,000-square-foot structure on the pier platform of the now-demolished New Market Building next to Pier 17. 

“The first thing is to make sure we can get our hands on it for public use,” said Michael Kramer, president of the Coalition, who presented the plans to CB1’s Parks and Waterfront Committee.

The property is owned by the city and overseen by the Economic Development Corp. It’s a site that Seaport developer Howard Hughes Corp. (HHC) has had its eyes on for years, including a much-criticized 494-foot tower proposal [2] in 2014 that it withdrew. Two years ago, HHC came up with a building concept [3] for the site that included community space. It was to be part of a package of possible community benefits paid for by its then-proposed tower at nearby 250 Water Street that required special city approvals. The design also included commercial uses and an event space.

The Seaport Coalition, currently battling [4] HHC in court over its development plans for 250 Water Street, wants to make the community center happen without relying on HHC funding. Rather, they imagine an all-public building that includes a third floor with “flexible all-purpose fields” and gym with high ceilings, and a landscaped roof. A marina is also part of the proposal.

There is no current lease or agreement with a developer for the site, according to EDC. A Howard Hughes Corp. spokesman declined to respond directly to the Seaport Coalition’s initiative or the CB1 resolution. “We look forward to continuing discussions with the community and the City about the future of the New Market site,” the spokesman said in a statement.

With a comparative dearth of recreation space, active or passive, on Lower Manhattan’s east side, a community center for the neighborhood has long been a local wish. In 2002, as part of its Downtown East River Concept Plan [5] for bringing new life to the waterfront, the city envisioned a building “transparent with an open-door plan for community and commercial uses.” CB1 and the Downtown Alliance, working with Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, created its own framework for Seaport revitalization around that time. They proposed a community building with a variety of public and “semi-public” uses that included a swimming pool, restaurant and bike rentals. 

Now that there’s a new drive for a community center—with plenty of questions about how to pay for it—CB1 in its resolution said that “important players” should “join the effort”to make the building a reality. Among them, the resolution says, are Financial District and Seaport property owners, EDC, and the Howard Hughes Corp. The board expects to form a task force to begin those discussions.

“Our first obstacle is to keep it in the public domain,” Kramer said in an email. “The next challenge is to design a building that meets the needs of a multi-generational population. We will then better understand the financials that underlie this proposal.” The Seaport Coalition is looking to an eventual public-private partnership for funding.

Community Board 1 also supports an initiative [6] to convert a site beneath the Brooklyn Bridge, known as the Brooklyn Banks, into recreation space, as well as making public a slice of sand near the bridge called Brooklyn Bridge Beach [7]. CB1 Chair Tammy Meltzer said she sees these potential amenities along with a community center as part of a “recreation zone” for residents north of the Brooklyn Bridge served by Community Board 3, as well as those in CB1.

EDC spokeswoman Regina F. Graham said in an email that planning for future use of the New Market site is connected to the Seaport Coastal Resiliency [8] design process. “Once design is complete for the Seaport Coastal Resiliency project and plans are in place for the adjacent areas,” she said, “EDC will commence community engagement on the future use of the site.”

“It’s not going to be easy,” said Parks and Waterfront Committee chair Paul Goldstein. “We’re going to have to be creative and see if we can indeed find partners to get this thing done.”

“But,” he added, “we have to start, and push hard on it.”