July 27 Rally After Wall Collapse - News Coverage

The Daily News has an editorial about the collapse. Back in May, the News found that there are many buildings with "cracked walls and shifting foundations" around the city, "thanks to work crews carelessly blasting and digging next door to occupied buildings whose residents have little trust that the city is protecting them." The News says that the DOB's 17 inspectors are not enough, given the amount of city-wide construction there is, and wonders if the DOB needs to rethink how it organizes complaints on its site; for instance, you can see violations by building site, but not by contractors.

Photograph of the site, taken on Thursday, directly across 97th Street at 65 West 96th Street, by Irving Polsky

Statement from Lois Hoffman, president of the Park West Village Tenants' Association:

“We want to thank Scott Stringer for taking a step toward returning sanity to this project today. If this development is completed as envisioned by Gluck and Chetrit, it will cut a well-planned, successful neighborhood in half with the second-longest, unbroken street wall along any avenue in Manhattan, and introduce other problems into the lives of thousands of area residents. Everything is off kilter – the scale of the development, the architecture, the marketing practices to potential commercial tenants, the disruptive manner and shoddy nature of the construction, the threat of exhaust pollution from the new building’s parking garage aimed right at nearby buildings, traffic and safety issues including a planned commercial loading berth putting 60-foot semis on 97th St. These mistakes will also hurt the commercial tenants who have already signed on, like Whole Foods, because they will be the public face of these problems for the local residents who are their potential customers.

“The mayor’s PLANYC 2030 for the future of New York says nothing about the relationship between planning, design and sustainability of communities. For the sake of all New York City residents, we call on Mayor Bloomberg, Dan Doctoroff and Amanda Burden to step in now and to start ensuring a meaningful planning process for so-called ‘as-of-right’ construction. Otherwise, this lack of meaningful planning will continue to crop up all over the city and will define our future.”

By Jen Chung in Real Estate
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NY 1

	City Officials Investigate UWS Wall Collapse
A wall collapse last night on the Upper West Side is prompting city officials to look into safety issues surrounding a major construction project. NY1’s Gary Anthony Ramsey filed the following report. In the Park West Village apartment complex, blasting and the sound it makes isn't new. “You can't listen to the television, you can't listen to the radio, you have no life,” said a resident. “You have absolutely no life. [Because of the noise?] Yes." But for the first time since construction began here last year, there was something new for 288 families in Park West to deal with, being forced to leave their homes and not knowing when they could go back. They had to evacuate 784 Columbus Avenue Wednesday night after a retaining wall collapsed at the construction site next door, exposing their building's foundation. The tenants they've been worried for months about what the construction might be doing to their building. "When I go out to do my laundry I go back around the back and I look to see if there are any cracks or fissures in the concrete that might indicate instability in the building,” said another resident. Inspectors say blasting may have brought down the retaining wall, which was put up to protect the building. The Buildings Department ordered an immediate halt to work at the construction site except for what was needed to repair the wall, and issued violations to the builder, Gotham Construction Corporation. But this was not the first sign of trouble in this project to build a 30-story tower here as part of a complex of seven buildings “The first time we saw the plans, which was before they actually started digging, we said they’re were problems,” said Lois Hoffman of the PWV Tenants Association. “And we had people, engineers and so forth, looks at their plans and said they’re going too deep, it’s too close to the buildings.” Gotham construction released a statement which said in part, "We have all been conducting a complete investigation and are cooperating with all the agencies involved to assess and remedy the situation. While no one was hurt, we have been and will continue to take all necessary precautions to ensure the safety of nearby residents and workers.” But those words are of little comfort to the people who live here. They’re still concerned their fears could once again become a reality if safety issues they've brought up in the past aren't addressed now. - Gary Anthony Ramsay