Parking lots or homes?

An absurd drama is now playing downtown at the South Street Seaport, where developer Howard Hughes Corp. wants to use a parking lot it owns at 250 Water St. to erect an apartment building. For reasons unclear, the lot, which has been barren for 60 years and is the largest empty plot in any of the city’s 149 historic districts, was in 1977 included in the South Street Seaport Historic District by the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission. Some observers believed the otherwise historically unimportant vacant lot’s inclusion in the historic district was the cunning result of lobbying from neighbors living in the high-rise apartments next door, eager to preserve for eternity their unobstructed East River waterfront views. The designation meant future developments at 250 Water would have to pass muster with the Landmarks board, who would judge not whether the proposed design was good for New York City, or a better use of rare space than a parking lot, but whether any proposed structures would be aesthetically and contextually “appropriate” in the Seaport district —a low-profile time capsule of Gotham’s early 19th century waterfront.

So when Howard Hughes presented their plans to the LPC in January, the commission agonized over whether they could ever approve such a tall building in a low-rise historic district, but urged the developer to try again.

Next week, developers will present the commission with a stumpier attempt at a “contextual” development. They’ve whittled down the total square footage by nearly a third, more than 200,000 square feet, shaved the height from 38 stories to 27, shrunk from 470 feet tall to 345 feet and redesigned the building’s base in response to the Commission’s suggestions. That also means 90 fewer new apartments, including 30 fewer affordable units.

If the Landmarks board says no this time, Howard Hughes is gonna try for something even smaller — a 160 foot tall building with some offices and apartments. No new affordable housing will be built, and no landmarks will have been preserved. Who does this process benefit?