Talk Bronx New York

Don’t pop the cork on the champagne just yet for that long-stalled 911 emergency call center in the Bronx.

First, the good news: The City Council is expected to give its final approval this week to zoning-related actions required for the $750 million project on a tract of land in Morris Park.

And now the bad news: The city still hasn’t reached a deal with the private owners of the 8.75-acre site, just north of the Hutchinson Metro Center.

Councilman James Vacca (D-East Bronx) helped pave the way for the expected zoning approvals by negotiating a community benefits agreement with the city.

For one, the height of the center will be capped at 254 feet, down 10 stories from the original 351 feet. And city officials agreed to a $1.1 million study of whether separate entrance and exit ramps should be be built to the site from the Hutchinson River Parkway. Read more..

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A proposed 911 call center that would have put a 37-story building in a Bronx flood plain is going back to the drawing board after the cost shot up to almost $1 billion.

The city had for two years estimated the cost of the 400,000-square-foot building at $670 million, but that jumped to $957 million when a proposed contract with Tishman Technologies was published last month.

“We are scaling back the project in order to maintain the essential elements, but at a lower cost,” said Matthew Monahan, spokesman for the Department of Design and Construction. “The early projected numbers were at another time in the city’s economic history.”

The NYPD says the center is a critical relief valve for the city’s 1 million 911 calls each month, which are all routed to MetroTech Center in Brooklyn.

The Bronx center would take half those calls when finished, but could handle all the calls in an emergency - and would be built to withstand an earthquake, a hurricane, a flood or a terrorist bomb.

Design documents say 750 people would work at the 911 center, requiring a 500-car garage. The city had hoped to finish the building by the end of next year.

Neighbors in Morris Park hated the idea of a 363-foot tower on a 9-acre office park site, as well as all those cars coursing through neighborhood streets, said City Councilman James Vacca (D-Bronx), who represents the area. Read more..

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