The following article is an updated version of the story that appears in our latest print edition. Since we went to press, we had the opportunity to speak further with Brad Zackson, director of development at Dynamic Star LLC, the developer behind the Fordham Landing project.  

 

Steps for the planned, billion-dollar “Fordham Landing” mixed use, real estate development in the University Heights neighborhood advanced further last week amid news that developer, Dynamic Star LLC, had filed construction applications with New York City Department of Buildings (DOB) for a 17-story, mixed-use building at 320 West Fordham Road, a site located south of University Heights Bridge.

 

Billed by Crain’s New York Business as the largest real estate development in the City since Chelsea’s Hudson Yards in Manhattan, Fordham Landing has fueled the ongoing debate over balancing the need to create more housing, including more affordable housing, with preventing the displacement of local communities due to rising housing costs.

 

Fordham Landing is located along the Harlem River shoreline and the Major Deegan Expressway and falls within Bronx Community District 7 (CD7), comprising Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham, Kingsbridge Heights, and University Heights. It also falls within Bronx City Council District 14, currently represented by Councilman Fernando Cabrera until the end of the year. In 2019, Daily Beat NY reported that Dynamic Star LLC, a Connecticut-based developer headed by CEO, Gary Segal, had acquired the site at 320 West Fordham Road from the La Sala family for $31.5 million.

 

Norwood News reported the same year how the overall goal for the project was to invest $3.5 billion in a 5 million square-foot area which was set to comprise 2,800 residential units, 30 percent of which were to be affordable, a 700,000 square-foot Life Science Center, esplanades, and a stadium for professional video gamers. Dynamic Star has since confirmed that the 30 percent affordable housing allocation still stands, but the overall project cost is now estimated at $2 billion, and is set to include an e-sports amphitheater and a music venue.

 

In 2019, the area north of University Heights Bridge was still being negotiated and presented more obstacles to the development since it stretches north to West 225th Street, but the Metro-North train tracks curve west towards the Marble Hill station at West 193rd Street. NYC Department of Transportation (DOT) also utilizes some of that space to get its equipment onto the Harlem River for bridgework.

 

Shawn Brede, deputy director at the Bronx borough office of the Department of City Planning (DCP) said, at the time, “While the site seems underutilized, we have found that it’s pretty important for DOT to have a site where they can access the water,” he said. “Aside from anything to do with land use or planning, this is just an incredibly complicated site.”

 

According to YIMBY, the entire Fordham Landing development was set to incorporate an assemblage of five neighboring lots spanning approximately 40 acres of land, formerly owned by CSX Corporation, a holding company focused on rail transportation. The site functioned as a rail yard. In 2020, YIMBY reported that Dynamic Star had secured an $18.85 million injection in the project from Meridian Capital Group to facilitate the construction of an additional building at 2475 Exterior Street, north of University Heights Bridge.

 

The same year, The Real Deal reported that the 2475 Exterior Street site had been purchased by Dynamic Star for $31.75 million from CSX Corporation. YIMBY reported that this site was to comprise 495,000 square feet, and contain a mix of affordable housing units, student housing, a public school, a research center, retail, and office space.

 

Meanwhile, Ronnie Levine of Meridian was quoted by YIMBY as saying his company’s investment was to facilitate the acquisition of the CSX site and to fund interest, carry, and closing costs.” He added, “Our next step is to pair Dynamic Star with a strong equity partner who will [be] able to take advantage of significant tax benefits, as some of the assemblage falls within an Opportunity Zone.”

 

The Opportunity Zone program is a federal, economic development program that allows people/firms to invest in low-income, distressed communities across the country to spur economic growth and job creation, while providing tax benefits to investors. Thousands of zones were identified and created under the Trump Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, including some areas of the Bronx.

 

The Real Deal reported that an Urban Institute study in 2020 suggested that Opportunity Zones have largely failed in their objective. When Norwood News spoke with U.S. Congressman Jamaal Bowman (NY-16) on Oct. 22, we asked if Congress planned to recoup tax monies from developers who have benefited from the Opportunity Zone program if they were found not to have fulfilled their part of the bargain.

 

In response, Bowman said, “100 percent, any private investment in a community would not be just about making exorbitant amounts of profit. They should also be to support the community in areas like housing, affordable housing, universal health care, quality education, and overall quality of life.”

 

In a subsequent interview with Brad Zackson, director of development at Dynamic Star LLC, Norwood News asked Zackson if the Fordham Landing project had availed of the Opportunity Zone program or any tax program, and if so, what community benefits had been negotiated and agreed as part of the discussions. He said the project had not availed of the program. “We’re going to use 421-a at the site, the normal things,” Zackson said.

 

The New York City 421-a and 421-g tax programs give tax benefits to property owners who construct new buildings or create residential units in buildings that were previously used for commercial purposes. Availing of such tax benefits places such buildings under rent regulation. As reported, the Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act was signed into law in June 2019, and implemented widespread changes to rent-stabilized and rent-controlled apartments in New York State. On June 25, 2019, certain technical amendments were made to the Act, renewing rent regulation statutes, and removing any expiration date.

 

Zackson explained, “The LaSala site [320 West Fordham Road] has qualified for it [Opportunity Zone program] but we really didn’t focus on that. That’s just not what we do, but the other site [north of the bridge] has not [qualified].” He continued, “North of storage [a storage company property], we have all the sites that go to [West] 225th Street, which is in a different zone. We just felt it is not helping us, and we felt that the site has its own merits and doesn’t need that, but if someone came as a partner and wanted to use funding from it, as long as it was fine… but right now, we have not focused on it, and would only apply for the normal 421-a tax code for the building as a rental.”

 

YIMBY reported that the Fordham Landing development is within walking distance of the 207th Street subway station, and is serviced by the 1 train and the Metro-North station which serves the Hudson Line. The proposed 175-foot-tall West Fordham Road development is expected to yield 582,122 square feet, with 553,835 square feet designated for residential space and 28,287 square feet for community facility space.

According to YIMBY, the building will comprise 602 residential units, most likely rentals, based on the average unit scope of 919 square feet. The concrete-based structure will also have a cellar, 274 enclosed parking spaces, and 274 open parking spaces. YIMBY also reported that Fordham Landing will comprise a mix of community facility, commercial, and residential space, with both affordable and market-rate units and 3 acres of public green space and waterfront amenities, including a community dock, kayak launch, and a marina.

 

Norwood News asked Zackson if any discussions had been held, to date, on the impact the new development will have on existing resources like schools, transportation links etc. “So, part of our process is called the EIS [Environmental Impact Statement], and we’re going to re-enact that,” he said, explaining that the project has evolved over time and was also affected by the pandemic. “We’ve changed, but due to the development now, we will be studying all those issues at work with the City Planning on what those things are, schools and other issues,” Zackson said.

 

“Traffic is the first thing, and all this is air quality. All of this is studied to do a rezoning prior to ULURP [Uniform Land Use Review Procedure], and City Planning sort of negotiates all this, but we will be addressing any, and all of those issues,” he said. Zackson said Dynamic Star plan to create local retail business and bring it into the site. “Working with local brands, restaurants, people that are from the Bronx…maybe some Inwood.. these are the people we plan on cultivating our retail with,” he said. “We’re giving them a couple of years to get going…an incubator retail program for some of the restaurants and smaller retail players.”

 

He said the company has already met with the owners of different restaurants “[Salsa] Con Fuego, he’s getting pushed out,” he said. “We’ve promised to bring him in. He’s a very popular part of our local culture. We’ve met with John a few times, Hugh Cortez, a local ex-police captain that helps with security and things in the neighborhood, I talk to him, once a month… really a great advocate of us and he’s going to work with me with the kids, actually teaching them real estate and getting them a license.”

 

Zackson, a Queens native, spoke of working on a prior waterfront project in Washington D.C. which he hopes to replicate at Fordham Landing. “It became a huge success between the restaurants, programming and all the boat activities,” he said. “We’re working with the waterfront alliance to figure out what’s the best way to use our waterfront, and what are the best operators to work with us,” he said. “We’re going to have things like rock-the-boat [and] sailing classes.”

 

In the context of the gentrification debate, Norwood News asked Zackson if he could yet say what the rental price range would be for the project’s affordable housing stock, knowing that 54.4 percent of Bronx CD7 households spend 35 percent or more of their income on rent, according to the latest available community district profile for Bronx CD7. That is more than the 50.9 percent of Bronx households and the 44.2 percent of City households who also spend more than 35 percent of their income on rent.

 

“Well, we’re going to work with the [City] Council, and we’ve already committed to Councilman Cabrera,” Zackson said. “We will continue that. They will work with us on what they feel the mixes should be, and the borough president’s office was very strong on that.”

 

We asked if Dynamic Star would be hiring locally, and hiring union workers. Chris Makos, senior associate at Dynamic Star said, “We formed an alliance with the Building & Construction Trades Council and plan to use all union labor.” He added that an agreement with the 32BJ union had also been signed.

 

We later discussed with Zackson some of the other standard-of-living indicators for Bronx CD7, such as 27.4 percent of Bronx CD7 residents having incomes below the City’s poverty threshold, a larger share than both the Bronx, at 26.2 percent of residents, and the City, at 19.8 percent of residents [who have incomes below the City’s poverty threshold].

 

We also talked about how Bronx CD7’s limited English-language proficiency rate, at 35.2 percent, was higher than the Bronx and City rates of 25.8 percent and 23.1 percent respectively, and how this affects employment opportunities, and asked for Zackson’s general thoughts on this in the context of the new development and the community’s needs.

 

In response, Zackman said he recognized that the district, like many others across the City, needed a hand up. “We’re going to be working with the local unions to make sure we hire local people, and that’s been a requirement,” he said, adding, “Gregory, the councilman’s right hand is on one of the boards there, and we’ve been working with him.” He added that the deal with 32BJ is to create a training program and to hire local people to train and run the property.

 

We mentioned that some Bronx union reps had highlighted how union construction labor did not always mean skilled labor, and how some developers or sub-contractors have attempted to undercut union construction workers by hiring undocumented, unskilled laborers for less money. We asked Zackson if Dynamic Star could make any commitments in that regard.

 

Well, we’ll be hiring with the union and all paying people good wages and all that,” he said. “There seems to be a trend around the country that’s going on in construction, but that’s not how we do things. Hopefully, one of the things I’m going to be working on is training young people [from 19 up] and helping them get their real estate license and mentoring them.” He continued, “Let’s face it – union is better than non-union. But my partner, Gary Segal, was the largest electrical contractor in New York, and third generation union. He has a very close relationship with all the unions.”

 

He added, “He’s been doing this for years and has worked with these programs where you hire locally to train, and I’ve done this with management. You really do want to train your doormen and porters and all your people from the neighborhood because these are great jobs, and these are the people that are loyal to you, but you want to train them for your buildings, especially a larger building like this [as it] can have many moving parts.”

 

Zackson continued, “We really want to be part of the community. We want to be here a long time. This is a big piece of the Bronx on the waterfront.” He said it would open up dinner boat rides, fishing, and all kinds of businesses on the water. “Besides some of the rowing and sailing, we’re going to have rental boats. There’s a trend in the United States where you don’t have to buy a boat. There’s places where you just rent for the day, you have a driver’s license, they assume you have it or test you out that you can drive it, and that’s something that we plan on bringing here,” he said.

He also talked about water taxi rides, and the layout of the pier. “The 2400 feet on the north side that we’re working to rezone is a huge amount of promenade waterfront that the public will now have access to,” Zackson said. “We’ll be providing programming and restaurants and community spaces and things. I think that waterfront will be a great asset to the whole Bronx, but surely for our neighborhood.”

 

Zackson also talked about how the State built Robert Clemente Park. “We were just amazed that that attaches to our site at La Sala, so we’re working with Con Ed and MTA to do a connection,” he said. “The La Sala site has about 700 feet of waterfront that’ll be normal promenade. The working promenade with the public, that’s about 40 feet, plus whatever else the building has for seating and things, but then we will have a walkway. The community are excited about getting Clemente connected and starting to connect greenways and the local whole waterfront.”

 

He said Dynamic Star has not yet met projected winner of the District 14 City Council seat, Pierina Sanchez, but plans to have discussions with her in the future as the project evolves. He said the group has held some initial discussions with Bronx Community Board 7 (CB7) District Manager, Ischia Bravo, officials from Bronx Borough President Ruben Díaz Jr.’s office, and with the borough president, himself, as well as with Bronx CB7 chair, Emmanuel Martinez, the latter on temporary gardening programs which he said got sidelined due to the election, but which he plans to revisit.

 

Zackson continued, “We really have been listening, and understand the community’s needs. Ruben Díaz, himself, and his zoning staff, they’ve all been working with us from day one, giving us community feedback to what they’d like to see, and I know recently they got the Highbridge opened up, and he was pretty excited about the potential of our property connecting further.”

 

Meanwhile, Makos said, “Dynamic Star has been working very diligently to clean up the site that has been an environmental hazard to the neighborhood for the past 20 years.” He said they were also working with the Harlem River Working Group [Chauncy Young, specifically] in support of the daylighting of Tibbetts Brook, which if realized, would flow through Fordham Landing into the Harlem River.

 

Zackson added that Dynamic Star was also working with Frank Díaz of SOMOS and Paul Lipson, among others. The latter served for seven years as chief of staff to former Bronx Congressman José E. Serrano. In 2009, Lipson served as principal author of The American Electric Vehicle Manufacturing Act (HR 4399), which aimed to scale up the domestic electric truck industry and help address air quality deficits incurred by medium duty fleets in places like the South Bronx.

 

Staying on the topic of the environment, we asked Zackson if any parkland would be knocked out because of the project. “Right now, we’re not.. just right now,” he said. “CSX is 11 acres of vacant land where the concrete plant that we bought out, we closed. The scrap plant, everyone’s been trying to get rid of them for 10 years in the neighborhood, because whatever… they’re not as environmentally friendly,” he said.

 

“The other side has been vacant for many years. We have one tenant still that we’ve been keeping and we’re going to be relocating, but otherwise we have no displacement out there and the only thing we’re going to be building is more parkland, waterfronts, and community space. The park, the community had a deal with is the DOT in the cove and then DOT pulled it back, and we’re pushing with the community and trying to get it back.”

 

We also asked Zackson if the construction of the new buildings would be done in an environmentally friendly manner, using environmentally friendly materials. “We definitely are,” he said, adding that sustainability was very important to the future development. “The world is moving away from the glass and steel that was very popular for a while, and we’re hoping to use more human colors and feel, like more of a wood feel and that kind of stuff in our development,” he said.

 

“We will be as green as possible. I think what COVID taught us is really important… to have better air conditioning and heating, ventilation,” he said, adding that the particular design of the office buildings would include wells. “All those rules we’ll be following and doing as much as possible. It’s all in the means of what the future is… looking for what the young people want and I think these kids are really into not how fancy something is [but] is it healthy? Is it organic?”

He said they also plan to have farmers’ markets and fresh food. “I, myself, only eat organic now. We’re definitely moving that way and you’ll see in the type of restaurants, in the food that we provide to the community… will be all fresh farm food.”

 

Perkins Eastman Architects is listed as the architect of record for the West Fordham Road site and demolition permits will likely not be needed as the lot is currently vacant. An estimated completion date is set for 2025, with ULURP filing and approval targeted for the second quarter of 2023.

 

Zackson concluded, “I’ve been here now working in the Bronx for three years, and I’m getting to know the people, myself, so it takes time, but we found some really, great people here, and that’s part of how we work. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t be investing so much in the place.”

 

Editor’s Note: Dynamic Star LLC clarified that the 2020 YIMBY article incorrectly referenced the Alexander Hamilton Bridge, rather than the University Heights bridge, when referencing the planned construction of the new building at 2475 Exterior Street. In the same YIMBY article, Ronnie Levine was incorrectly referenced as a senior managing director at Dynamic Star LLC, rather than at Meridian. The print version of this story in the latest edition of the Norwood News includes these two references to the 2020 YIMBY article, which are, we understand, in the process of being corrected. This online version of the story also corrects them. We apologize for these two errors as they appear in our latest print edition.