New York City is in trouble, but few residents know it. Oh, sure, they know about crime, traffic, and the price of eggs, but they don’t know how rapidly the city is losing affordable housing. And losing it with a big push from City of Yes cheerleaders, primarily its mouthpiece: the Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY).

Existing affordable units are being torn down at an alarming rate, with either no or very few “affordable” units in the replacement buildings. The city is losing small apartment buildings, renovated tenements, the former “cold water flats” that were often young people’s first apartments. The epicenter for this phenomenon is Yorkville, once the refuge for immigrants from Germany and Central Europe and now long subsumed into the Upper East Side. Here, desirable (and often rent-stabilized) apartments are being sacrificed for luxury towers that those young seekers can’t afford. 

For example (and there are many more than the ones I cite here): Thirty-four affordable units in 5- and 6-story buildings on East 86th Street are slated to be replaced by a 23-story, luxury building with no affordable units allocated. On Third Avenue and East 75th Street, 43 affordable units and four commercial units on the ground floor are being replaced by 38 high-end apartments in a new luxury building of unknown height, with no commercial units on the ground floor.

At 1045 Madison Avenue, 14 luxury units replaced four row houses with 13 affordable units and 9 commercial tenants. The commercial spaces lost were occupied by the small businesses that neighborhood residents had come to depend on and that helped give the neighborhood a personal feel.

Similar plans seem to be announced daily. At 1221 York Avenue, between 65th and 66th streets, is a 6-story building with 82 units. The replacement tower is set to be 25–30 stories and contain an unknown number of luxury units.

What’s happening in Yorkville is a microcosm of what’s happening in neighborhoods all over the city. Yorkville happens to have a high concentration of these former tenement buildings because of its history as a refuge for immigrants decades ago.

The fundamental problem is that the City of Yes legislation was an open call to build, build, build, without any requirements that the number of lost affordable units be replaced. An amendment to the 1,400-page-long legislation that required replacement in new buildings equal to the number of affordable units torn down failed without serious consideration. The oft-repeated rationale was that New York has not been building enough new housing. Really? Have people not watched Long Island City, Downtown Brooklyn, and the Far West Side explode with new apartment buildings in recent years? Virtually all of the new upscale buildings merely replaced numerous affordable units that stood in their way. The more that was built, the more was lost.

As a policy, build, build, build simply doesn’t work in creating and supporting affordable housing. The trickle-down theory promoted by REBNY has never worked in the 50-plus years that I’ve been observing the housing scene. When apartments go on the market, the rental price invariably goes up. 

Yorkville is the poster child for this phenomenon. A 2020 study by George M. Janes & Associates of rent-stabilized units from 2007 to 2020 showed a net loss of 14,438 units on the Upper East Side and 11,127 stabilized units on the Upper West Side, the two highest among the community board study areas. The borough of Manhattan showed a total loss of 37,466 affordable units. 

It’s worth repeating: Increased height does not mean increased density, and often results in fewer affordable units.

New Yorkers are being deceived. They think the new towers going up all over are helping solve the housing crisis when, in fact, they’re making it worse. Sure, foreign oligarchs and American millionaires are finding what they’re looking for by purchasing units in these towers, but they’re not the constituents in need. Middle-class families are leaving the city, primarily due to unaffordability. In fact, many of the rising towers provide less density than the lower buildings that have been torn down. It’s worth repeating: Increased height does not mean increased density, and often results in fewer affordable units.

Five years ago, the Skyscraper Museum mounted the exhibition “Housing Density: From Tenements to Towers.” It showed, in great detail, how, even before Robert Moses, the towers going up were less dense than the whole blocks being demolished. Those lost blocks were not only denser in residential population, they often contained churches, schools, civic institutions, shops, and even small industrial sites.

It was a definitive show, demonstrating how New York City de-densified, creating fewer units of affordable housing. Sadly, its lessons went completely unlearned. As current developers tear down more tenements and small apartment houses and build new high-rise towers with fewer units, New York continues the trend.

This is the crux of the housing crisis we now face. In many cases, the demolished small apartment buildings—whether brownstones, tenements, or small apartment houses—are categorized as “empty.” Of course they’re empty: the tenants have been either forced out or bought out. Not counted are the units landlords purposely hold off the market. Also not counted are the units owned by private equity. This is a national problem; it even became a campaign issue in Montana. Private equity goals are simple: to maximize profit by raising the rental cost as high as the market will bear. Compounding all this, publicly funded defense lawyers, desperately needed by dispossessed tenants, are woefully underfunded by the city.

So, what would constitute a truly affordable housing policy? A sound approach that addressed the real need would do three things: preserve existing affordable units; defend tenant rights; and require new residential buildings to replace the number of affordable units they are erasing. Further, a demolition tax would discourage unnecessary demolitions. A true affordable housing policy would also tax private equity–owned properties at a higher rate. This ownership trend further shrinks the market for affordable units, guaranteeing increased rents and co-op prices for apartments.

Historic preservation covers just 5% of the city, so why is it getting 95% of the blame? REBNY has been trying to undermine historic preservation for years, claiming erroneously that it stands in the way of more affordable housing.

Instead of developers confronting the real problems of diminishing affordable housing, they have singled out historic preservation as the straw man, the major obstacle to all of their problems. And yet, historic preservation covers just 5% of the city, so why is it getting 95% of the blame? REBNY has been trying to undermine historic preservation for years, claiming erroneously that it stands in the way of more affordable housing.

The truth is, some of the best affordable housing can be found in historic properties, whether or not they have been officially designated as landmarks. Complaints are aimed at the few brownstones that are converted from four apartments to one-family residences. But we don’t hear about the thousands and thousands of affordable apartments remaining in brownstones and small apartment buildings all over town. 

Historic preservation—the conversion of an historic building to affordable housing use—adds affordable units in multiple creative ways that also preserves the character of a neighborhood. The Historic Districts Council recently released a very edifying report showing 11 recent examples of uncelebrated projects. Not all are in landmarked buildings, but all contribute to a sustainable urban city with a true personality and sense of place. The T Building (formerly the Triboro Hospital), an Queens Art Deco structure landmarked through the collaboration of creative developers and the community, provides 200 supportive and low-income units, in addition to 50 moderate-income units and communal and rental office space. Federal and state tax credits did the trick. In fact, the density here was only possible because of the historic designation of the existing building, as its density is greater than current zoning allows.

Undesignated buildings—like the original St. John’s College on Willoughby Street in Brooklyn and the old Brooklyn Union Gas Company on Remsen Street—are being converted to housing without landmark designation. Adaptive reuse is just good development (even without tax credits!). We don’t hear about this, because REBNY is calling the shots for pro-development groups, who see adaptive reuse as a threat to their bottom line. REBNY’s other longstanding goal is to rid the city of rent-regulated apartments.

As all these trends continue, through the distorted vision of a new construction imperative, the city loses more affordable housing and more density. The economically diverse and affordable city is indeed in trouble, both now and in the future.

Featured image via Wikimedia Commons.