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Downtown Brooklyn Development Opportunities
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Downtown
Brooklyn's Assets:
- Office
Space: 11 million square feet of office space
in the commercial core, including six million
square feet of prestigious Class A space with
a vacancy rate of 0.2 percent. These buildings
have high quality standard finishes, state of
the art systems, exceptional accessibility and
a definite market presence.
- Corporate
Tenants: critical mass of Class A tenants, including
Chase, Keyspan, Blue Cross and Blue Shield,
SIAC and Bear Stearns
- Employment:
70,000 workers in Downtown Brooklyn, many at
operations centers for financial service companies
- Academic
Institutions: seven institutions in and around
the Downtown area with over 32,000 students
- Housing:
exceptional housing stock in surrounding brownstone
neighborhoods and 500 units in the core with
1,200 residents
- Cultural
Resources: 300,000 square feet of cultural space
drawing hundreds of thousands of visitors annually
- Infrastructure:
comprehensive transit network and infrastructure
systems
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Zoning enacted in 1961 did not foresee extensive change
to the existing business district, as it was then defined
by Court Street, the Civic Center and Fulton Streets
department store corridor. Since that time most commercial
redevelopment has required publicly sponsored zoning
changes and other government actions, such as urban
renewal and direct investment, to facilitate enlargement
of the office core on sites that were dominated by lofts,
small buildings and parking lots. These actions resulted
in the development of the Pierrepoint Plaza office building,
the 5.5 million square-foot MetroTech campus, and the
Renaissance Plaza office and hotel complex. Most recently,
in July 2001, the City Planning Commission approved
the Special Downtown Brooklyn District (SDBD) with more
flexible height and setback controls and several upzonings
that have resulted in construction of new apartment
houses.
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