JeffReuben
Academy Substation on Sherman Creek
“The new Academy Substation’s siting results from capturing a moment of technological history in regulation. Academy is to sit on land once occupied by a power-generating station. In the old days, generating stations needed to be close to water. The unenclosed substations still in place were originally installed to be near the generating station. These and other industrial-type facts on the ground led to M zoning for Sherman Creek. Proximity to water is no longer necessary for power facilities, but the zoning and existing facilities serve to keep—or, in the case of Academy Substation, entice—them there, cutting off the waterfront from active, people-friendly uses. The new substation will be enclosed (and by materials more attractive than concrete and chain link), but the existing open-air facilities will continue to occupy acres of the peninsula, discouraging redevelopment of nearby properties, even if the zoning designation is changed to R or C.
“If Academy’s lot had lost its M zoning, the utility would have needed a CPC special permit to put a substation on the 2.3-acre site. Generally a transmission substation can fit on a 80,000-square-foot site (i.e., less than two acres), but when Con Edison has space in hand, it tends to use it all rather than find ways to conserve it or combine uses. With its existing substations in place and with plans to build another on property it already owned, the utility resisted the Sherman Creek rezoning efforts. There was (and is) no incentive for Con Edison to undertake the difficult and expensive task of moving or concealing the extant equipment. As a result, the southern chunk of the Sherman Creek peninsula will remain unavailable for the foreseeable future.
“The one piece of good news in the case of Sherman Creek is that the new Academy Substation’s facade will be designed and the grounds landscaped to blend with marinas to the peninsula’s south. Increasingly, Con Edison has been employing this approach—at Astor in Manhattan and Mott Haven in the Bronx, for example.”
Excerpted from: “The Neighborly Substation”, by Hope Cohen, Center for Rethinking Development, Manhattan Institute, December 2008
Academy Substation on Sherman Creek
“The new Academy Substation’s siting results from capturing a moment of technological history in regulation. Academy is to sit on land once occupied by a power-generating station. In the old days, generating stations needed to be close to water. The unenclosed substations still in place were originally installed to be near the generating station. These and other industrial-type facts on the ground led to M zoning for Sherman Creek. Proximity to water is no longer necessary for power facilities, but the zoning and existing facilities serve to keep—or, in the case of Academy Substation, entice—them there, cutting off the waterfront from active, people-friendly uses. The new substation will be enclosed (and by materials more attractive than concrete and chain link), but the existing open-air facilities will continue to occupy acres of the peninsula, discouraging redevelopment of nearby properties, even if the zoning designation is changed to R or C.
“If Academy’s lot had lost its M zoning, the utility would have needed a CPC special permit to put a substation on the 2.3-acre site. Generally a transmission substation can fit on a 80,000-square-foot site (i.e., less than two acres), but when Con Edison has space in hand, it tends to use it all rather than find ways to conserve it or combine uses. With its existing substations in place and with plans to build another on property it already owned, the utility resisted the Sherman Creek rezoning efforts. There was (and is) no incentive for Con Edison to undertake the difficult and expensive task of moving or concealing the extant equipment. As a result, the southern chunk of the Sherman Creek peninsula will remain unavailable for the foreseeable future.
“The one piece of good news in the case of Sherman Creek is that the new Academy Substation’s facade will be designed and the grounds landscaped to blend with marinas to the peninsula’s south. Increasingly, Con Edison has been employing this approach—at Astor in Manhattan and Mott Haven in the Bronx, for example.”
Excerpted from: “The Neighborly Substation”, by Hope Cohen, Center for Rethinking Development, Manhattan Institute, December 2008