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KaiDaiz t1_jeem3p3 wrote

More essential infrastructure improvements - I'm sure the nearby residents will complain and be against just like the new blood bank building few blocks away

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cmc t1_jeemeg7 wrote

I am obviously not an architect nor a city planner but I do wish there would be more conversations about all the commercial buildings that are struggling to find tenants being converted instead of more new plans for more new buildings.

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KaiDaiz t1_jeemo3e wrote

There are no large existing commercial building next to the hospital. Is mostly residential buildings up there or mix use. Thus have to build new

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muderphudder t1_jeep70l wrote

>the structure could rise up to 594 feet tall and yield nearly 1 million square feet of facilities for cancer care, surgery, and medical research.

Hospital and research labs require floor plans, infrastructure, and safety precautions that you can't economically tack onto existing commercial office buildings even if there was an appropriately sized existing building in the immediate area.

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trebleformyclef t1_jeer73f wrote

Aw man. My favorite hospital room/bed will lose it's view.

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suitcase88 t1_jees1pf wrote

Will it be named the Donald Trump Pavilion?

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Equivalent-Excuse-80 t1_jeesgii wrote

“Here’s a new state-of-the-art cancer research center that would invaluably improve the lives of thousands of cancer patients in New York”

“Not in my neighborhood!”

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azdak t1_jeets56 wrote

my first thought is "whelp, cant argue with that"

my second thought is "people will find a way to argue with that"

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pixel_of_moral_decay t1_jeeuxym wrote

That’s not really true. Hospitals extend into commercial office space all the time. NYU took over at least one or two office towers for ambulatory care several years ago. Some floors feel like being in a hospital if you didn’t know where you were. They do all sorts of procedures and stuff in them.

And there’s lots of medical labs in office buildings. You absolutely can put them there unless you’re working with something the government heavily restricts like anthrax research, but that’s not normal.

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drpvn t1_jeev3rs wrote

GEORGE: Steven, nothing is higher than architect.

STEVEN: I think I'd really like to be a city planner. Why limit myself to just one building, when I can design a whole city?

WYCK: Well, that's a good point.

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SolitaryMarmot t1_jeev8fb wrote

MSK is broke and laying people off. The state taxpayers will end up paying for this and there are much better, more efficient hospitals the state should suppport first.

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CactusBoyScout t1_jeew6xj wrote

The UES has successfully stopped the MTA from adding an accessibility elevator at the Hunter College subway station for over a decade now.

"Neighborhood character" apparently means being a fucking nightmare for anyone with mobility issues.

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maverick4002 t1_jeeyqqv wrote

Per the comment at the source, the building its replacing is housing.

Is this MSK housing or general housing. What will be the result of getting rid of those apartments?

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KaiDaiz t1_jeezenz wrote

MSK housing of residents and students & I'm sure they will house them somewhere else or exit the housing game & just issue housing stipends only. Sux, there's a faculty bar that's attached to the nearby Rockefeller building, free beer on fri night as long keg don't run out. At least that was the case last time I visited

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dvd_man t1_jef01po wrote

Ya not true. Every university campus on earth has buildings retrofitted for research labs. It’s not always pretty but it’s most certainly doable. But administrators love their pet construction projects and legacy buildings.

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Aleph_NULL__ t1_jef1do9 wrote

which is really just cruel to begin with but also hurts everyone. Tried getting off at grand street recently? just a few people with mobility issues can really back up the entire system. it's not their fault, they need more time to get down -- they need an elevator. it would help everyone

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CactusBoyScout t1_jef208m wrote

I take transit to the airports all the time and elevators make a huge difference even for those with no mobility issues. Luggage, bicycles, strollers, etc.

If I take transit to JFK there are elevators at every transfer.

But my quickest route to LGA involves multiple transfers with no elevators so it’s a real pain.

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sventhewalrus t1_jef3luo wrote

average public meeting comment: "I worked hard all my life to be able to afford to live in my Upper East Side co-op that I inherited from my grandfather. And now, you're going to let hundreds of lazy leeches move into our neighborhood, just because they checks notes have cancer?"

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KaiDaiz t1_jef43el wrote

its going to be complaints about blocking view and sun & building too tall for character of the area- just look at the long battle with residents regarding the blood bank research center 2 or so street from this proposed building

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Mustard_on_tap t1_jef59jm wrote

You know, if someone wanted to install a fountain that shits free gold coins for everyone people would still organize against it.

This city, I swear.

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F_LOCAL t1_jef5or5 wrote

This address is already a hi-rise, so I guess it’s just going to be torn down and built another 15 stories? I don’t care. Just don’t tear down any stabilized housing. -someone who actually lives in this area.

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YoungWizard11 t1_jef6jmz wrote

This is true, and though they're expanding the station is ridiculously small considering how many people use it. Never knew it NIMBYs promoting this bs, always thought it was the city and MTA just not giving a shit like usual

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YoungWizard11 t1_jef6u8g wrote

It would be really great if this happened, MSK does primarily translational research, which is focused on bringing treatments from the lab into the clinic. An expansion to facilitate could really help improve and speed along research!

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TetraCubane t1_jef78e8 wrote

31 stories high is not a skyscraper by nyc standards

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chestercat2013 t1_jef7awt wrote

The city has some fairly strict regulations around research labs because the city is so densely populated. Newer buildings can, for example, store more flammable solvents safely under the fire code (which is more strict than EPA regulations).

Ventilation in the buildings, especially one doing heavy research in a city, must also be extensive. The building I did my graduate research in was updating ventilation for the entire duration of my degree and it still wasn’t working well.

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barbaq24 t1_jef8xi2 wrote

The cost of those lab conversions in NYC are pretty eye watering but the cost of the construction isn’t the biggest driver of organization looking at new buildings. It’s all these new energy laws for New York. Labs require a ton of energy to run for gases, fume hoods, air exchanges, computing etc.. The building energy use ratings for converted labs are hanging heavy on these organizations. It’s all happening pretty fast with Local Law 97. Even if you built a new building that opened last year, if you have natural gas or a cogen unit your outdated.

Not to mention the compromises that New York labs make when converting old spaces. It’s not the same as most labs in the country. You have serious coordination issues with all the services and you pretty much reduce the average space design of a lab by 30% compared to the global benchmark. So you end up building a $2-4k/sqft lab with 30% less space than your experts told you it should be. Or you address the renewable energy issues, build the right floor heights, design the building for labs with have a proper utility core and make the spaces 20% smaller than recommended, all while building for around $1800/sqft when you include all the nonlab spaces of a new building.

Its a complex issue that a lot of folks are trying to address. So while lab conversions are thing, everyone complains about them, they are expensive, and they cost even more to run because of the cities energy conservation requirements.

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surferpro1234 t1_jefaj10 wrote

Sometimes you don’t want a tower to block the sun from your window. Am I being selfish…probably. At the same time…it’s Manhattan. It’s not so black and white. Also I don’t live near there but still

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SolitaryMarmot t1_jefbsxh wrote

MSK is a disaster. Its wildly mismanaged. Its become an industry punching bag for good reason. They have become one of the worst actors in the state health care system. They've been plagued by scandal since just prior to the pandemic when their C suite execs got caught taking payoffs from drug companies and trial sponsors without any type of disclosure. They sold their tissue databank to a proprietary start up artificial intelligence company that happened to have a CEO on the board of the hospital. This was after they went all in with an IBM that heavily overpromised and underdelivered on AI led analysis which led to a ton of mistakes on patient diagnostics. The CMO resigned and the CEO resigned from the boards it turned out he was conflicted on. Then after the pandemic hit the CEO also resigned from MSK. They only begrudingly took COVID patients during the pandemic but still got $100 million in pandemic aid. If they treated 500 patients by then I'd be shocked. And they had no qualms about it either, which Mediciad patients were crowded 5, 6, 7 to a nurse in the public hospital ICUs.

This "hospital" routinely gets caught overbilling the state for uncompensated care, at the same time they have the lower percentage of Medicaid patient of any hospital in the city. And their actual outcomes are slightly worse than the state owned public cancer hospital Roswell Park Cancer Center in Buffalo.

If their board decides what they really need right now after years of losses is a brand new shiny east side skyscraper...that's fine they can go borrow money and build it. The taxpayers shouldn't put a dime into or backing their debt because on their own they would be in complete junk bond status.

0

goalmouthscramble t1_jefdi5b wrote

Good grief between this and the new blood center on 67th Lenox Hill will look like midtown.

−13

SolutionRelative4586 t1_jefh8jo wrote

> Sometimes you don’t want a tower to block the sun from your window. Am I being selfish…probably. At the same time…it’s Manhattan. It’s not so black and white.

This is exactly it.

You can't move to Manhattan and ask it to freeze in time just the way you found it.

If you want to live somewhere with no changes go buy a big plot of land in the middle of nowhere.

Cities change by definition. That's what makes them cities.

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Keyboard-King t1_jefhbjx wrote

My old city was getting eaten up by the hospital. It just kept buying real estate and expanding. It became depressing because an entire section of the city became a parking lot and hospital with nothing else around except more hospitals buildings. We’re not even that big of a city so the size of the hospital was ridiculous and the bulldozing of the surrounding area pointless.

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BarbatosIsKing t1_jefhsnh wrote

Ahh this building is mostly empty anyway.. very few residents stay there.. the rooms are all ridiculously dated

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thebijou t1_jefik8d wrote

Interesting considering they opened up the Koch building a few years ago

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thepobv t1_jefjx2r wrote

Seems like a good thing? Why are people upset?

We need more housing tho :(

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Woodnote_ t1_jefmr8d wrote

Resident/fellow housing, it’s my old building. RIP 16J, you were a good though very basic apartment for a year.

I assume they’ll just make residents find their own housing now. We weren’t even sure until about a month before moving if we were going to get one, I was panic apartment shopping.

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wahikid t1_jefpxib wrote

I used to live in the current building at that address. It’s student and employee housing for the hospital and Cornell medical school. It’s currently like 15 or so stories already (I think, we lived on the 13th fl) so, I don’t really understand what the uproar is all about. It’s not like there was a park or a historic low rise there currently. It’s already a big ugly building, they just want to make it bigger and uglier, probably.

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PastramiReubens t1_jefyn3t wrote

I interned there during my freshman year of college. Good people doing amazing work. Hope their plans go through.

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amoebaamoeba t1_jeg2yu9 wrote

Seriously. It has to be one of the most character-less stretches of street (which describes most of the UES between 50th and 90th/Lex to York). And that particular stretch of streets is all medical facilities anyway!

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treesockshirt t1_jeg3mm5 wrote

I live on 71st and my only issue with the blood bank (from what I know) is they are demolishing a park and a high school to build it.

I’m all for buildings like this, the blood bank even homeless shelters. Just put it in the lots where they are putting up multi-million dollar condos like at 1562 2nd ave instead.

−1

Spring-Available t1_jeg6qd5 wrote

Funny I’m reading this as I sit waiting for radiation in the main campus building at 1275 York Ave.

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KaiDaiz t1_jeg6vl2 wrote

The blood bank does not demolish the school or park - those are located across the street. The plan was to demolish old building and build new one. Its height would cast a shadow on the school and park at certain hours. That's the complaint they going with on paper but I'm sure its related to other reasons to residents nearby. They don't care for the school or park

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cocktails5 t1_jegabb2 wrote

It's funny because this sub is totally behind this sort of essential infrastructure but when it comes to Con Ed...

https://www.reddit.com/r/nyc/comments/125mdb5/reminder_public_hearings_on_coneds_rate_hikes_are

everybody is just like "fuck Con Ed, I shouldn't have to pay for electricity."

Which is especially funny because a significant portion of that rate hike is going towards clean energy infrastructure. It always amuses me as someone that works in energy that people talk a good game when it comes to clean energy but don't actually want to pay for it. Do people think infrastructure is free? I don't get it.

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AbeWasHereAgain t1_jegg1ep wrote

It was Johnny Hopkins and Sloan Kettering. And they were blazing that sh*t up every day.

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FourthLife t1_jeghzza wrote

They’re certainly going to help a lot of people with cancer. And contribute a lot to a body of research that will develop new treatments and cures.

Maybe that was their focus when designing the building instead of making it conform to your aesthetic preferences? Healthcare is already costly enough in the US as it is without spending extra on pretty buildings.

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Substantial_Bend_580 t1_jegzio5 wrote

Correct me if I’m wrong but couldn’t they save a fuck ton of money using one of the many empty buildings in Manhattan? Not a bad idea but i wonder if money and time could’ve been saved

−1

CactusBoyScout t1_jeh0k3h wrote

The MTA would have to build a new entrance for the station and the NIMBYs basically say that it would bring too much foot traffic and noise to this one street or something. Plus construction noise and the usual NIMBY spin-the-wheel of bullshit.

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CactusBoyScout t1_jeh0rp3 wrote

My brother lived on Cape Cod years ago when they were debating bringing rail service from Boston to the Cape.

The locals opposed it, even though traffic on the Cape is absolutely brutal in summer, because “we don’t want the trash from Boston getting out here” aka keep the poor people out.

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karacocoa t1_jeh200b wrote

Strange. They've been laying people off.

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