14th St. metamorphosis nearly complete

Real Estate Weekly, May 29, 1996 by Lois Weiss

At one time, the street was considered the Northern boundary for the city's fanciest homes, and the society occupants amused themselves with forays to their great opera house - the Academy of Music - that is now a nightclub and potential development site.

But as the elite crowds moved their residences uptown, the streetscape deteriorated and the area became synonymous with the labor movement and union meetings.

Over the past 50 years, 14th Street continued with its plebeian orientation and became known as an affordable place for working people to buy clothing. The clientele was catered to by shops such as S. Klein and Mays.

But by the 1980's, those great department stores were shuttered and a series of low - priced vendors and bazaar-type outlets had created a mecca for even cheaper merchandise and electronic marts that stretched across the Street.

In 1982, the city's first Business Improvement District (BID) was formed as the businesses of 14th Street faced the problems of litter, security and graffiti - overcoming them shop by shop, street by street.

When Paragon opened in the 1970's near 18th Street at the North end of Union Square Park, they were looked at askance. But they drew from the Sixth Avenue Barnes & Noble down the street and managed to hang in. And now Herman's, Nordic Track and another Barnes & Noble have opened across Broadway and facing the park on 17th Street.

Union Square Park, the great union rallying point, had become a haven for drug peddlers and was consistently avoided by neighborhood residents and visitors alike.

That was cleaned up through extensive efforts of the 14th Street business Improvement District, the Local Development Corp., and community boards.

This month, residents formed the Union Square Conservancy to raise dedicated funds and help maintain the park permanently. A Conservancy doesn't have to only help a very large park like Central Park or Battery Park, explained Rob Walsh, executive director of the 14th Street BID.

"It can also be used when it plays a key economic development role in the neighborhood," said Walsh. "You could easily argue that this neighborhood started turning around when the park was renovated."

The renovation of the park was followed by the construction of Zeckendorf Towers that has since brought in hundreds of middle and upscale residents.

"It's a development that was destined to happen," said area property owner Alan Cohen, pointing to the subway network and transfer center that has most lines stopping somewhere along the street.

"When we cleaned up the park and had the Zeckendorf development, it was inevitable that both retail and entertainment - the heartbeat of Manhattan - would move there."

The area is already home to thousands of college students who populate the New School, New York University, Parsons, Cardozo and NYU Law Schools, Baruch and others. There are three college dorms near 14th Street on the Third Avenue corridor and NYU has just decided to build another dorm on the former Luchow's site, that only too recently was slated for a new homeless residence.

The change from homeless to student is symblematic of the transformation of the neighborhood from downscale to fashionable.

The Related Company, that has won awards for its restoration at the 17th Street Barnes & Noble store, recently razed older properties on a key comer of Broadway and is about to start construction on an exciting retail, entertainment and housing complex.

Toys "R" Us and Nobody Beats the Wiz are selling on opposite sides of the park; Staples is open in the Amalgamated Building; PC Richards, the Long Island appliance biggie has opened its first Manhattan store, K-mart is poised to move in slightly down Broadway and the retail consultants are crowing the street's benefits as the next frontier.

"Wait, you ain't seen nothing yet," said Robert Greenstone of Garrick-Aug Store Leasing. "You have such development possibilities on 14th Street, it's not funny. The smaller owners between Broadway and Sixth Avenue haven't a clue as to what they own and how they can market the space to affect a positive change in the area."

The stretch that Greenstone referred to is the most notorious of the area's schlock stores: open fronted bazaar type stores with clothes and assorted plastics hanging from the rafters and large hand lettered signs proclaiming their one dollar generic merchandise. Other stores are notorious for primarily second rate cameras, recorders and other electronics.

"If you want to have Schlocky Sammy running electronics, or switch and bait, that's what 14th Street will remain for awhile," warned Greenstone. "But eventually, it will change."

That change is coming fast to 14th Street. Within the last three years, the Sixth Avenue Ladies Mile from 14th Street to 23rd Street has re-transformed itself into a retailing paradise, and 14th Street beckons with its East and West running welcoming arms.

"Just connect the dots," advised Green-stone.

The availability of the former large retailing spaces surrounded by commercial office entrepreneurs in the electronic and paper publishing fields, advertising agencies and musician support services in the lofts and apartment houses of Gramercy Park, Greenwich Village, and Noho make the area's new population very much like the that of the Flat Iron district.