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Officials Break Ground on Delayed Massive Residential Complex in Jamaica

By Ewa Kern-Jedrychowska | April 25, 2017 10:09pm
 After months of delays, officials broke ground Tuesday on a $407 million massive two-tower mixed-use complex planned for the Jamaica AirTrain station area that will bring 669 affordable housing units to downtown Jamaica.
After months of delays, officials broke ground Tuesday on a $407 million massive two-tower mixed-use complex planned for the Jamaica AirTrain station area that will bring 669 affordable housing units to downtown Jamaica.
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DNAinfo/Ewa Kern-Jedrychowska

JAMAICA — After months of delays, officials broke ground Tuesday on a massive two-tower mixed-use complex near the Jamaica AirTrain station area that will bring 669 affordable housing units to downtown Jamaica.

The $407 million project, known as The Crossing at Jamaica Station, is the largest development in the area in decades, officials said.

The 773,000-square-foot towers, developed by BRP Companies, will also include 35,000 square feet of retail space, a community facility, 187 parking spaces and roof terraces.

“We’ve never had anything like this before,” said Yvonne Reddick, district manager for Community Board 12.

“This is greater than the AirTrain," Reddick said referring to the 2003 opening of the AirTrain station on Sutphin Boulevard which — along with a rezoning in 2007 — brought major changes to the long-neglected area.

Downtown Jamaica has since been undergoing a transformation, with a slew of new developments, although some projects were stalled by the 2008 financial crisis.

BRP, which first announced the project in March 2014, initially expected to break ground in the first quarter of 2015, but it took two more years to begin construction.

“Bringing all those elements took longer than we anticipated but it was done,” said Meredith Marshall, managing partner of BRP Companies, adding that the project involved both the city and state, as well as the local community. It also required securing financing, which was partially provided by the city's Housing Preservation and Development, Housing Development Corporation as well as Goldman Sachs.

The 30-story high-rise at 147-40 Archer Ave. will have 539 mixed-income apartments (incomes ranging from $38,100 to $104,775 for one person and $48,960 to $134,640 for a family of three), and the 15-story mid-rise at 148-10 Archer Ave. will include 130 low-income units (incomes ranging from $25,400 to $75,625 for one person and $32,640 to $97,125 for a family of three), BRP said.

Rendering of The Crossing (Courtesy of FXFOWLE)

“The towers that will rise here will forever change the skyline of Jamaica,” said Hope Knight, president of the Greater Jamaica Development Corporation, a local nonprofit group that works to bring new investments to the neighborhood and assembled the parcel years ago before recently selling it to BRP.

Knight, who called the project “a powerful symbol of the revitalization of downtown Jamaica,” said it will send a message to other developers “looking for the next hot neighborhood.”

Rendering of The Crossing (Courtesy of FXFOWLE)

Glenn Greenidge, executive director of the Sutphin Boulevard Business Improvement District, said he hopes to attract an Apple store as well as Nordstrom Rack to the commercial space in the building.

“One of my goals is to have people come out of the Jamaica LIRR and AirTrain stations so that they can begin to shop here," Greenidge said.

BRP expects to complete construction by mid-2019.

The Crossing is one of several projects currently under construction near the AirTrain station.

Other developments include two hotels — Courtyard and Fairfield Inn and Suites — which will be adjacent to the Crossing and will bring more than 330 hotel rooms, as well as a 26-story apartment building at 147-20 94th Ave., featuring 380 apartments, some of which will also be affordable.