07/21/2022
It's Thursday and that means time for :
Towers in the Sky 🗼☁
Famous world wide for their skyscraping pinnacles, the towers of NYC hold bedrock foundation in the imagination of visitors and natives alike.
From the original Empire State Building, still a wonder today at 90+ years old, to the Twin Towers, their replacements at the World Trade Center, and Manhattan's newest neighborhood in the clouds, Hudson Yards, we couldn't imagine the City without its trademark architectural feature.
But beyond all the romance, a Tower actually holds its own special spot in the City's Zoning Resolution.
Inherently at odds with the Sky Exposure Plane, that most essential and fundamental concept of NYC Zoning, which restricts the height of our buildings to protect the light and air of the canyons of Manhattan's streets and avenues, the Tower at once epitomizes the City and at the same time undermines the most basic order of our built environment.
In certain high density commercial and R10 residential districts, we architects have the privilege to entirely disregard the Sky Exposure Plane, and go as high in the sky as our developer clients can gerrymander lot lines to assemble air rights from their unsuspecting neighbors.
Of all the massing typologies in the Zoning Resolution, from single-family homes with large front and side yards, to Quality Housing, and industrial sheds, the Tower, ironically, has the fewest restrictions of all.
Simply provide a rear yard, a setback, and keep yourself to 50% of the lot, and go high, all the way to the cosmos 🚀
Make sure to follow to get more tricks of the trade and let me know YOUR zoning questions in the comments below 👇
