By Ryan Schwach<\/p>\n
President Donald Trump and Mayor Zohran Mamdani said Monday they have agreed to move an ambitious plan to build 12,000 homes in Queens at Sunnyside Yard to a \u201cnew level.\u201d <\/p>\n
After meeting at Gracie Mansion this week, Trump and Mamdani said the plan to build over the Sunnyside rail yard in western Queens is still on the table and moving along to the next phase. Though building the projected $21 billion new neighborhood in Western Queens is still no sure thing. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe’ve agreed to set up a new level of that conversation between our housing and operations team at City Hall and the White House team,\u201d Mamdani said while Trump stood beside him outside the mayor\u2019s Upper East Side home. \u201cWhat we’re speaking about is 12,000 homes, 30,000 jobs, the prospect of an entire new neighborhood in a city where housing is the number one cost, and I appreciate the president\u2019s interest in this.\u201d <\/p>\n
The mayor said that the pair agreed to have their deputies engage in more \u201ctechnical\u201d discussions about the plan and what it may take to accomplish it, including getting necessary federal authorizations. <\/p>\n
\u201cThat’s what this kind of conversation facilitates,\u201d the mayor said. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe are sincerely interested and committed to this as an idea, which is why it’s been the focus of the conversations I’ve had with the president,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n
Trump, who was once a housing developer in his native borough and who fondly recalled owning a \u201cgreat building\u201d in Sunnyside, called it a \u201cbig job.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cI’ve been watching that for 35 years, everybody’s wanted to do something with Sunnyside Yards,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
When Mamdani first met the president in the Oval Office last November, just weeks after he was elected, he emerged with a suggestion that Trump could help fund the massive housing project at Sunnyside Yard. <\/p>\n
The $21 billion idea would include 12,000 new affordable homes, including 6,000 new Mitchell-Lama-style homes, as well as parks, schools and other amenities over the Sunnyside Yard train tracks. Most of the upfront cost would go into building a massive deck over the existing rail tracks so housing could be built on top of it. <\/p>\n
In the months since the idea was first discussed, no other details have arisen, leaving Queens residents and elected officials somewhat weary of the potential cost and the involvement of the president, who remains wholly unpopular in New York City. <\/p>\n
On Monday, Trump said the plan would likely require federal approvals and input but refrained from committing federal dollars to it. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s always been a great location,\u201d Trump said. \u201cWhen [Mamdani] mentioned Sunnyside Yards, they’ve been talking about developing that for 50 years. So, maybe they have a shot at doing it.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Ryan Schwach President Donald Trump and Mayor Zohran Mamdani said Monday they have agreed to move an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":352933,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123],"class_list":["post-352932","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=352932"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/352932\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/352933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=352932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=352932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=352932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}