Envision SoHo/NoHo Update & SoHo Broadway Planning Goals

The Initiative has adopted a series of planning goals that aim to foster an environment that is attractive to residents, businesses, and visitors

The Envision SoHo/NoHo planning process is an initiative undertaken collaboratively by Manhattan Borough President Brewer, Council Member Margaret Chin, and the Department of City Planning as Process Sponsors to examine key land use and zoning issues in the two neighborhoods and seek community input to develop strategies to both honor SoHo/NoHo’s history and ensure the continued vitality of the neighborhoods.

During the first six months of 2019, the Process Sponsors, with the help of Jonathan Martin of BFJ Planning and Pratt Institute, convened a series of public sessions to hear from the local community on topics including housing, jobs, arts and culture, preservation, retail, quality of life, and creative industries. Insights and findings from the public discussions and Advisory Group meetings are being distilled into a report, expressing values and priorities of the SoHo and NoHo stakeholders and putting forward recommendations.

While we eagerly await the release of this report, the SoHo Broadway Initiative has developed and recently adopted a series of planning goals, which are enthusiastically supported by residential and commercial stakeholders from SoHo Broadway. These goals are designed to meet the primary needs of residential and commercial interests to enhance the unique mixed-use environment while not favoring one group over another. Residential and commercial interests made compromises to create a carefully balanced interconnected set of goals. If one goal is removed or one set of interests favored, the carefully balanced compromise falls apart.

We believe that pursuing strategies that achieve these planning goals will foster an environment that is attractive to residents, businesses and visitors for decades to come:

• Improve the overall quality of life by creating a more welcoming, accommodating, and accessible environment for those who live in, work in, and visit SoHo Broadway
• Allow people to live here As of Right who are not certified artists while protecting current JLWQA occupants/uses and rent-protected units
• Allow retail use As of Right limiting contiguous retail to the basement, ground, and second floors along the SoHo Broadway corridor and low-impact retail uses (e.g. yoga studios, spas, hair care, galleries, etc.) above the 2nd floor
• Maintain the globally recognized creative and commercial communities that are key components of SoHo’s mixed-use neighborhood
• Preserve the historic look and feel of SoHo while maintaining the current scale and density
• Create publicly funded incentives to provide affordable opportunities for artists to work in SoHo and venues to celebrate the arts/creative community
• As a result of this process, don’t increase real estate taxes

We hope you will join us in supporting and advocating for practices and policies that work to achieve these goals and create a better SoHo Broadway for residents, businesses, and visitors.

If you would like to set up an information session with the Initiative to discuss these goals and learn more, please contact Executive Director Mark Dicus at mdicus@sohobroadway.org

For more information on zoning in SoHo, see the Initiative’s SoHo Zoning Guidebook.