St. Vincent's Hearing Ends After Too Many Hours

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The marathon has ended. Day two of the Landmarks Preservation Commission hearing regarding the St. Vincent's/Rudin plan in Greenwich Village finished up at 2 p.m. Here's a follow up to the earlier report on the day's activities:

Statements from the public ended at 11:30 and out of the 24 additional speakers since my last update, only a couple were in favor of the proposal. The St. Vincent's team has been answering the commissioner's questions since then. Highlights include a comment by their land use attorney referencing a Jane Jacobs quote about how hospitals serve the public in such a way that they overcome preservation goals. One of the LPC commissioners has been questioning the architects on the possibility of decreasing the height of the hospital proposal. He asked if they considered using the triangle, building bridges across 12th Street, etc., which they did. Later he suggested that since the Village is already a jumble of dead end streets, the possibility might exist to close that section of 12th Street to allow a larger floor plate and a lower hospital. All just a thought, of course.

Hearing ended at 2:00 but in the closing statements, one last highlight: In response to the comment by SVCMC's land use attorney in reference to Jacobs' thoughts on hospitals which came more than two hours earlier, one of the LPC commissioners noted that "Jane Jacobs also spoke about the arrogance of institutions who considered their interests more important than the community."

The LPC chair said that this discussion will be continued sometime in May and that they will give plenty of notice to the community on the exact date when they determine it. He also said that the questions raised here today will lead to a very positive discussion in that next meeting.

Until May, everyone! [CurbedWire Inbox; St. Vincent's coverage]

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