With the building permits to add seven stories and seventy-four condos atop the existing 31-foot warehouse at 72 Townsend Street quietly reinstated at the end of 2012, the project has been sold to KB Homes which plans to start work next month.
The 74 new South Beach condos which will range in size from 810 to 2,859 square feet and come with one parking space apiece should be ready for occupancy by the middle of 2015 with a sales office opening next summer.
Does anyone else wonder what the original developers and architects of these warehouses would have done differently if told their works were to be preserved for eternity?
Theo, I think we could easily ask the same question of the architects that are designing these < 9 story condominium buildings.
As I understand it (someone please correct me if I’m wrong), a subsequent owner or developer who wants to tear down the building to-be-completed by KB Homes and build a newer, presumably taller, building (perhaps to take advantage of the massive upzoning that socketsite supply-siders think is the solution to the housing crisis in The City and will inevitably happen in the near future) will have to negotiate with and buy out each of at least 74 distinct owners of the then-existing condos in order to demolish the building and redevelop the site.
Since that’s unlikely to happen due to the economic and coordination constraints, the 9 story building’s pretty much going to be there forever barring eminent domain action or a major natural disaster rendering the building uninhabitable.
So the 9 story building’s going to be preserved forever.