A preliminary city plan to create a Morningside Heights Historic District could place significant checks on the University’s development.
The Landmarks Preservation Commission, the city agency that oversees and creates historic districts, is now pushing forward with a potential plan to designate Morningside Heights a historic region—in a proposed area where 43 of the 63 buildings are owned by Columbia.
“Columbia is a very large landowner within Morningside Heights,” said Simeon Bankoff, executive director of the Historic Districts Council, a nonprofit preservation group. “Should the LPC designate a district, then they would own a lot of landmark buildings, which they would not be able to tear down easily.”
Once an area is designated an historic district, most external changes to buildings—and any renovations or demolitions—have to be approved by the LPC.
Local residents and elected officials have been pushing the LPC to consider the neighborhood for protection since 1996, arguing that its architectural history and variety are worth officially recognizing.
In September, LPC officials proposed boundaries that stretched from 110th to 119th streets along Riverside Drive, which includes some Columbia dorms. The agency says the plan is not definitive and it is currently conducting further research.
Getting approval for changes takes time, said Alexis Stephens, BC ’05, of the Neighborhood Preservation Center, an advocacy group. “It would probably be something that would be a major hassle to them [Columbia],” she said.
But Andrea Goldwyn, director of public policy for New York Landmarks Conservancy, said that designating the neighborhood wouldn’t negatively impact the University.
“It’s not particularly onerous,” she said of the LPC process. “You need to have maintenance, and Landmarks Commission process does add a layer of regulation, but it’s also good guidance about what’s best for the building to keep it safe and secure and continue to be a nice link to the neighborhood’s history.”
For other activists, though, restricting the University is the point—something that Andrew Berman, the executive director of the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation, emphasized. In overseeing its neighborhood’s nine historic districts, his organization often works to restrict New York University’s development goals.
“It is by no means an all-encompassing action that means no change whatsoever in terms of a university and its position within a community, but obviously it’s a significant layer of regulation which can go a long way in terms of conserving the physical fabric and scale of the neighborhood,” Berman said.
The University declined to comment on what impact a historic district would have on its operations and whether it would support a historic district or involve itself in the planning, referring only to a 2009 University statement. “We are certainly open to the study of an appropriately-defined district in the area,” spokesperson Robert Hornsby said then, adding that Columbia “has long been a good steward of its valuable architectural legacy.”
For Stephens, this stance is typical. “I’m not surprised at all that they haven’t been exactly transparent in their attitudes toward preservation.”
The LPC is also currently reviewing additional buildings outside of the proposed area.
At a September LPC meeting in Riverside Church, Community Board 9 member Brad Taylor voiced concerns that the proposed area doesn’t include Broadway and Morningside Drive.
“There’s got to be some politics at play. It can’t just be based on merit,” Taylor said.
Lisi de Bourbon, an LPC spokesperson, said that the agency decided after the meeting to review some of the streets east of Broadway, though there is no timeline yet.
Assemblymember Daniel O’Donnell, who has been at the forefront of the fight for years, said that he has not heard more from the LPC since September.
“However, I’m hopeful that this delay means the LPC is taking into account the overwhelming community support for an expanded historic district and carefully designing its new map to match what the community so clearly wants,” O’Donnell said in a statement.
Sarah Darville contributed reporting.
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