At the corner of Lafayette Street and Great Jones Street in NoHo is an automated parking structure now at the center of intense debate.

Many people who came to a public hearing Tuesday hoped to convince the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission that the approximately 20-story tower proposed by developers is much taller than neighboring buildings that it doesn’t fit the aesthetic of the neighborhood.

What You Need To Know

At a public hearing Tuesday, the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission heard comments from supporters and opponents of a proposed development to build new housing at the site of a parking lot on Lafayette Street in NoHo

Residents who oppose the proposal say the design of the new apartment buildings is too tall and would tower over neighboring buildings

The commission did not set a date for a vote but asked the developers to consider the public comments before it revisits the matter

“Architecturally, the styling.,” NoHo resident Dino Buturovic said. “You’ll see it’s something that is so out of touch with the neighborhood.”

“I understand we need housing in New York and that parking lot was inevitably was going to be developed,” Susan Breindel of NoHo said. “I live directly across from it, and I was very taken aback when I saw the size and the scope of the building.

As part of its presentation Tuesday, members of the development team, including EJME and Edison Properties, pitched that the “punched window” terracotta exterior fits in with other buildings found in NoHo. 

The team also argued that the scale of the building fits historical precedent.

“This is the very evolution of the place, where you had small-scale buildings immediately adjacent, and that is part of what makes the district so dynamic, is that variety,” Erin Ruley, a development team member of Higgins Quasbarth and Partners., said.

In a statement to NY1, a spokesperson for developer EJME wrote: “This project transforms a parking lot that has sat underutilized since 1971 into more than 200 homes, including at least 50 permanently affordable apartments, steps from one of the best-connected transit hubs in the city.”

“It’s exactly what the SoHo/NoHo rezoning was designed to deliver, and we look forward to working with stakeholders and local leaders to get it right for the neighborhood,” the spokesperson continued.

When the rezoning of NoHo and SoHo was adopted in 2021, it came with the explicit promise of expanding housing opportunities.

Andrew Berman is the executive director of Village Preservation, a nonprofit that has been a leading voice in asking that important design elements be reconsidered.

“It just looks massive and overwhelming,” Berman said. “So there are some things they can kinda do to break it up, give it a little more variety, give it a little more color, things that make it look like a traditional New York building and not 20 stories of grid paper, graph paper — or something like that.”

The Landmarks Preservation Commission did not vote on the proposal Tuesday, opting to give developers time to consider comments from the public.

A date to revisit the proposal has not yet been set.