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Apologies to Stephen Smith at YIMBY for borrowing so heavily! Click through for his post.

No surprise of course that this corner at NY Ave and Rutland is going to be residential. The first line of Mr. Smith's post says it all though..."another day, another Flatbush filing." Also, note that current zoning does not have the commercial overlay that would encourage ground-floor commercial. Too tall, no added vibrancy.

by Stephen Smith for YIMBY

Another day, another Flatbush filing.

Today’s is for a development planned for 599 New York Avenue, in the Prospect Lefferts Gardens subsection of Flatbush. There, on the northeastern corner of New York Avenue and Rutland Road, Floral Park-based developer David Dilmanian is seeking to erect a six-story, 22-unit apartment building, reaching 65 feet into the air.

Designed by Karl Fischer, the building’s 22 apartments will be spread over a bit under 16,000 square feet of residential space, for a rental-sized unit average of a bit over 700 square feet. The second and third floors will have five apartments each, and the fourth through sixth will each have four.

While each of the other three corners of the intersection have ground-floor retail, the city’s unbending and non-contextual zoning code does not allow new commercial space in this area, so this project will have none. It will, however, have some active ground-floor uses in addition to the 11-car parking garage (the minimum number of spaces required by the zoning code), in the form of a 723-square foot community facility space.

599 New York Avenue traded hands late last year, when the developer bought it for $1.5 million, or $92 per buildable square foot.

Down and to the southeast comes this building (thanks MikeF, er WhyNot at Brooklynian - his thoughts on crime mapping worth reading here).

Interestingly, this building on Ocean south of Church is part of a wall of gorgeous old pre-wars and some freestanding stuff. Ocean is wide, so the building can go taller than a narrow street. Since it's been contextually rezoned, to R7A, there are the following requirements:

The floor area ratio (FAR) in R7A districts is 4.0. Above a base height of 40 to 65 feet, the building must set back to a depth of 10 feet on a wide street and 15 feet on a narrow street before rising to a maximum height of 80 feet. In order to preserve the traditional streetscape, the street wall of a new building can be no closer to the street line, than any building within 150 feet on the same block, but need not be farther than 15 feet. Buildings must have interior amenities for the residents pursuant to the Quality Housing Program. Off-street parking is not allowed in front of a building. Parking is required for 50% of all dwelling units.

These newer distinctions (the A's and B's next to zoning like R7) are part of the Quality Housing initiative, designed to keep residential development within reason and matching the character of the surroundings. Maybe it doesn't go far enough. But it's better than one narrow tower, that would have given nice views of the Park and beyond. Probably Manhattan and the harbor. When I was up on the top of a six story on Ocean at Caton, I was absolutely stunned by the gorgeous view.

The rebuilding continues unabated.

How about this cute little number at 25 E. 19th near Church? Gonna be an 8-story as well: