16-Story Apartment Building to Replace Metropolitan Hospital Parking Lot

EAST HARLEM, NY — The Metropolitan Hospital in East Harlem filed plans with the Department of Buildings to transform its parking lot into a 16-story apartment building.

The plans were filed Wednesday by an entity called the NYC Health and Hospitals Corporation, which operates the 11 public hospitals in the city. The building will rise 16 stories and contain 153 apartment units, according to the building plans.

The address of the new building will be 1880 1st Avenue and the building will occupy the full space of the parking lot which takes up the area between 97th and 99th streets.

The first floor of the building will contain several maintenance facilities, storage for 77 bicycles and a main lobby with a mail room, according to the building plans. Amenities such as more storage, a recreation room and a fitness center will occupy the second and third floors and floor four through 16 will be occupied by apartments.

The building will zone 650 square feet for community facilities and 131,316 square feet for residential use. In total the project will contain 131,966 square feet. If all apartments are built to be the same size, the average apartment would contain around 858 square feet.

Dattner Architects are listed as the project designer, according to the building plans.

Photo: Google Maps street view circa January 2013