MTA eyes $1B in HQ rent deal

The MTA on Thursday announced plans to redevelop its old Midtown headquarters, a move that transit officials said will dump at least $1 billion into the agency’s rapidly depleting coffers.

Boston Properties, a real estate company, will lease the 103-year-old complex from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. The company will transform the complex, on Madison Ave. between 44th and 45th Sts., into a new space that reaps the agency a “maximum return,” officials said.

Real estate taxes and other revenue from the building will go into the MTA’s capital plans.

City officials have for two years blocked the deal because it funnels taxes away from the city’s budget.

The agency planned to use the money to pay for a series of unfinished construction projects near Grand Central Terminal, including redevelopment of its subway stations, and the completion of the MTA’s long-delayed East Side Access project, which will bring Long Island Rail Road service into Grand Central via a new set of East River tunnels.

The building is connected to Grand Central by an enclosed passageway.

Mayor de Blasio’s administration backed down from its objections.

“This type of redevelopment deal is consistent with what we envisioned when we agreed on a funding commitment to the MTA’s 2015-2019 Capital Plan,” which covers a portion of the Grand Central projects, said Dean Fuleihan, the city’s first deputy mayor.

The MTA moved its central employees out of the Midtown headquarters in 2014 and opened up a new shop at 2 Broadway in lower Manhattan. Transit officials have tried to offload the old property ever since.

The MTA needs the money from the deal as the coronavirus pandemic hammers the agency’s finances.