How will you spend your Thanksgiving break?
NYU has purchased a new undergraduate residence hall in Gramercy Park that will be available for students this fall, university officials said Friday.
At last Thursday's University Senate meeting, Executive Vice President Michael Alfano announced the purchase of Gramercy Green, a 21-story building at 316 Third Ave., just north of 23rd Street.
The new dorm is expected to house 900 upperclassmen and will offer apartment style rooms with full kitchens. Rooms will include shared studios for two or three students and two- and three-bedroom units for four to six students.
Gramercy Green will also offer a study room, lounge, computer rooms, multi-purpose rooms, game rooms and a fitness center.
MOVING OUTSIDE THE VILLAGE
While NYU expansion into the Gramercy Park/Murray Hill neighborhood is not completely new - the university already owns property in the area, including its 26th Street and University Court residence halls, as well as several of its medical facilities - the dorm's purchase is one of the first moves to reflect the university's newly adopted expansion principles.
Over the past few months, NYU has begun to roll out plans for NYU 2031, the university's projected 25-year expansion strategy that seeks to acquire 6 million square feet by the university's bicentennial.
The plan calls for NYU to expand beyond the university's academic "core" at Washington Square Park - a neighborhood where the university's rapid expansion has put it at odds with Village residents. One of those areas, the "Health Corridor," would be near the new dorm.
Andrew Berman, executive director of the Greenwich Village Society for Historical Preservation and a regular critic of NYU's expansion, said he was pleased with the university's new purchase.
"We are ... very glad that NYU has chosen this approach, which is consistent with the Planning Principles' requirement that NYU 'identify opportunities to decentralize facilities' and 'cultivate locations outside [the Village campus and surrounding neighborhoods],' as well as GVSHP's call for the university not to expand beyond its existing footprint and envelope within our neighborhood," Berman said in a statement to WSN.
FAREWELL, FINANCIAL DISTRICT
Alfano said the new dorm, along with the university's 12th Street residence hall, currently in development, will alleviate the deficit of student beds left by the losses of Cliff Street and Water Street residence halls. The shuffle will introduce 100 additional beds for freshmen and will eliminate a situation that could have left hundreds of students homeless.
Last year, the Rockrose Development Corporation, which owns the Cliff Street and Water Street residence halls, announced it would sell the Cliff Street building, while NYU announced it would not renew its lease on the Water Street dorm when it expires in 2009. Collectively, the Rockrose properties house just over 1,500 students. While NYU will keep Water Street until 2009, Cliff Street will no longer be available after this semester.
Meanwhile, NYU has started construction on the 26-story 12th Street dorm, which is expected to house 700 freshmen. Once that is complete, University residence hall, which holds about 600 freshmen, will once again house upperclassmen, as it did before fall 2005.
In a statement to WSN, university spokesman John Beckman could not say how much the university had paid for ownership of the building, citing confidentiality agreements.
"Speaking generally, though, the purchase of this building and the 12th Street residence hall begins saving the university money in year two compared to the rental of Cliff and Water, and it provides the university significant economic benefits from then onward," he said.
Beckman also said that the university does not yet have specific room rates for the new dorm, but expects them to be comparable to the Carlyle Court and Lafayette Street residence halls.
Sergio Hernandez is a staff writer. E-mail him at shernandez@nyunews.com.
