Breaking ground for the building at 399 Sands St. were, from left, City Council Member Robert Cornegy Jr., Deputy Major Alicia Glen, developer Doug Steiner, Navy Yard CEO David Ehrenberg, and Navy Yard chairman Henry Gutman (Photo by Arden Phillips)
The Brooklyn Navy Yard, in the midst of its largest expansion since World War II, broke ground today on its latest construction project. The building, 399 Sands St., will add 230,000 sq. ft. of manufacturing and creative office space, enough to accommodate 700 to 1,000 new jobs, officials said.
At the groundbreaking, Alicia Glen, deputy major for housing and economic development, announced a $40 million investment by the city toward the building through New York Works, Mayor de Blasio’s program to create 100,000 good jobs in the next decade. “It’s always great to be here because you see where old and new are really coming together,” Glen said. “And I think there’s really no better example of how we can take this historic past and capture our future.”
The new building, near the Yard’s Sands Street gate, will be part of the Admirals Row section (Rendering courtesy of the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corp.)
The nine-story 399 Sands will devote its first four floors to parking for 430 cars, available to customers visiting the adjacent Wegmans supermarket, expected to open in 2019, and other Navy Yard tenants. Floors five through eight will be dedicated to manufacturing space, and the ninth floor for creative office space, officials said.
The new building will be part of a cluster called Admirals Row, named after the officers’ housing that once stood on the spot. The first three buildings in Admirals Row are currently under construction. The project also includes the reconstruction and adaptive reuse of two historic structures.
“Admirals Row, together with 399 Sands, represents a new urban model for mixed-use development,” said Doug Steiner, whose company Steiner NYC is developing that section of the Yard, in a press release accompanying the groundbreaking. “And Wegmans, which is consistently ranked as one of the top ten companies to work for in the U.S., is the ideal anchor tenant.” All told, the Admirals Row development is expected to provide space for 2,000 new jobs.
An aerial view of the future Admirals Row, looking toward Downtown Brooklyn (Rendering courtesy of the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corp.)
“We focus on creating sustainable, high-quality, middle-class accessible jobs. That, for us as a landlord, means providing real estate and space where companies can not only survive but thrive here,” said David Ehrenberg, president and CEO of the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corp., at the ceremony. The new building “is just the latest example of how we’re returning the yard to its rightful place as the heart of the borough’s economy,” he added.
The Navy Yard currently houses about 400 companies employing more than 7,000 people. In the next three years, that number is expected to more than double to 17,000 accessible, middle-class jobs, according to Yard officials. In November, the Yard opened Building 77, a refurbished WWII-era structure that went through a $185 million renovation to produce a light-industrial hub with 1 million sq. ft. of space. Nearing completion is Dock 72, a brand-new, 16-story office building that will contain 675,000 sq. ft. of commercial space.