All stories about "Port Authority Office Building"

A Vanishing New York retrospective is the real estate equivalent of being read the last rites, so it was only a matter of time before the Reaper came calling for Show World, or what's left of it. You see, Show World used to be the porn anchor of the Times Square of old—its neon lights serving as a siren call to sketchy guys streaming from the Port Authority who needed to get their circus-themed jollies. Show World survived Giuliani's anti-nudie zoning ordinances, but pieces were slowly stripped away, and now the Laugh Factory and a huge Duane Reade occupy old Show World space, with a sliver surviving a couple doors down. Today, Steve Cuozzo reports that 303 East 42nd Street, which includes a 12-story office/apartment building, some small theaters and Show World, is for sale. Owned by a trust that is controlled by Show World's boss, the property could go a variety of ways, including a ground lease or partnership. But it may just get sold outright, and the clock could be ticking on the old perv. With 11 Times Square on the rise nearby and a potential Port Authority skyscraper on the way, this formerly seedy corner of Eighth Avenue is suddenly a burgeoning office district—which is amazing news to some, and a travesty to others.
· Stripped Of His Crown [NYP]

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The Post's Steve Cuozzo reads the tea leaves on the commercial and residential real estate markets, and he says that we're in for some troubled times. Not a shocking declaration given the level of panic out there concerning the credit crunch and Wall Street layoffs, but Cuozzo does not concern himself with paltry matters of the present. No, the Cuozz has his eye on 2010 as the winter of our discontent, because "an unusually high percentage of office leases will roll and many glamorous new condo projects will open their doors." In the meantime, Cuozzo writes that the current climate will make it difficult for certain far-fetched ideas to get realized, like the office tower that's supposed to sprout from the Port Authority bus terminal or even Sheldon Solow's East River waterfront plan. But all is not doom and gloom. In comes Curbed Network BFF Jonathan Miller to point out that the credit crunch may actually limit future damages to the market, because fewer apartments and buildings will be built due to a lack of financing.
· A Discouraging Word [NYP]

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The Port Authority has tried to sell off the development rights above its Midtown bus terminal before, but the plan fell through. Sure, it may have been 9/11 that soured the deal, but the crushing depression that would sweep through the ranks of any company that moved into a building above the Port Authority might have also had something to do with it. Either way, now that the corner of 42nd Street and Eighth Avenue is something of an office mecca—with the new Times HQ and the coming 11 Times Square—the Port Authority is trying again. The deal, to be announced today, calls on a joint venture of Vornado Realty Trust and the Ruben Company to erect a deck over the northern portion of the four-story bus station and build a 1.3-million-square-foot office tower. Over the next year, there will be an architectural design competition to figure out what this monster will look like, and the companies have four years to build it. It's too early to speculate on potential tenants, but as long as it's not us, we're cool.
· Tower Planned Atop Port Authority Bus Terminal in New Wave of Development [NYT]