Bloomberg Plans Midtown Makeover

Michael Bloomberg has made significant changes to the New York skyline during his terms as mayor, and now he hopes to renovate the face of Midtown East.

Mike Slattery, a vice president of the Real Estate Board of New York, supports the mayor’s plan. Indicating a brown brick building on the corner of 42^nd Street and Madison Avenue, he said:

“These are not the kind of buildings that are desirable today.” He pointed across the street and explained: “This is one of the few buildings that have been built in the last 15 years in the district.”

Said building is glass, and twice as tall as the structure across the street. According to Slattery, the
newer building is environmentally efficient, while the high ceilings and open floor space are more modern and high end. Corporate tenants will accept no less, he explained.

The newer building “competes with Tokyo, Shanghai and London. That’s what’s at stake here: New York’s preeminence as a commercial capital,” he said.

Bloomberg’s intended facelift would add five million square feet of office space and generate $100 million in extra tax revenue per year.