12 Miles of Lower Manhattan Streets are Dark, Dirty, and Dangerous
Some Blame ‘Temporary’ Construction Sheds That Can Linger for Years
A chronic complaint about Lower Manhattan’s streetscape is the proliferation of sidewalk sheds, which surround buildings at the ground level during construction, demolition, or repair work on facades. Although nominally classified as “temporary” shelters meant to protect passersby, the average age of a sidewalk shed for the City as a whole is 565 days. (There are more than 8,000 of these structures currently active throughout the five boroughs.)
According to the City’s Department of Buildings (DOB), the confines of Community Board 1 (delineated as the area south of a jagged line traced by Canal, Pearl, and Baxter Street, and the Brooklyn Bridge) are currently home to 212 sidewalk sheds, with a cumulative length of 62,179 linear feet, or the equivalent of 11.7 miles of local streets. Of these, 16 are more than five years old and one (at 46 Warren Street) has been in place since March 2015. (Its current permit is valid through next January, but could be extended.) These metrics rank CB1 as the seventh most-blighted community by sidewalk shed footprints anywhere in the five boroughs.
Their impact is significant. A 2024 study by Mastercard found that in Manhattan, the company’s accountholders spend between $3,900 and $9,500 less each month at businesses located in buildings with sidewalk sheds. (Actual losses are likely far higher, because these tallies do not reflect the use of other credit cards or cash purchases.) Restaurants and bars were found to be the most affected, reporting a decrease in weekly transactions between 3.5 percent to 9.7 percent in the six months following shed installation. Sidewalk sheds, which are often poorly lit, can be magnets for uncollected trash and furtive activity.
They are, however, a lucrative industry, raking in an estimated $8 billion per year, citywide. According to Rand Engineering & Architecture, a Manhattan-based consultancy, a typical sidewalk shed costs approximately $125 to $150 per linear foot for installation and the first three months of rent, followed by charges of roughly six percent of the initial installation cost for additional monthly rentals.
The former American Stock Exchange Building at 86 Trinity Place is a local case in point. DOB data indicate that this 165-foot long sidewalk shed (pictured here) has been in place since September 11, 2018 (or 2,733 days). Rand’s metrics say this structure would have cost between $20,625 and $24,750 to install, followed by monthly rental ranging between $1,237 and $1,485.
For building owners, the price of the repair work needed on facades above these sheds – which can be delayed almost indefinitely once shedding has been installed – is often so onerous that absorbing the monthly rents on these temporary structures can seem, by comparison, like an acceptable cost of doing business. This is especially true for Lower Manhattan, where dozens of buildings are more than a century old.
Help may be on the horizon. At the February 18 meeting of the Quality of Life Committee of Community Board 1, Jesse Lang, a housing and transportation policy analyst in the office of Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal, explained that a series of laws enacted by the City Council last year will soon come into effect. Although these statutes apply to the City as a whole, they will likely have a particular impact in Lower Manhattan, with its disproportionate share of sidewalks sheds.
“The idea is that they will look better, be less intrusive, and, and will be more appropriate for the streetscape than just the ugly green sheds that we have all come to know and hate,” Ms. Lang said. The monotonous design to which she referred (plywood painted hunter green, held together by metal pipes) which has for many years been required by DOB regulations, will be broadened to include other colors and kinds of structural support.
“What’s next for actually getting these implemented is that DOB needs to work with the companies that came out with the designs, so that sidewalk shed companies can start to offer them to building owners,” Ms. Lang continued. One caveat is that these new designs are not mandatory.
More consequential may be changes in permitting and enforcement. “Currently, sidewalk shed permits are issued for a year at a time,” Ms. Lang said. “This law will reduce that to just three months. Then, once a building owner renews a permit for a second time, they are going to have to demonstrate to DOB that they are actually doing the facade repairs that the shed is up for. Otherwise, there will be penalties.” These include monthly Public Right of Way fines (up to $6,000) for sheds standing longer than 180 days, and additional penalties for buildings that miss facade repair deadlines. An expanded “Long Standing Shed Program” will target sheds in place for three years or more with stricter enforcement and potential court action.
One indication of the zealousness with which DOB will enforce these laws may be gleaned from another requirement that came into effect in January, which mandated that the agency must notify community boards of new shed permits within their neighborhoods. Ms. Lang noted that ten new permits for sidewalk sheds in CB1 were issued in January, and continued, “I was actually curious if this came to Community Board 1 in February.”
CB1 district manager Zach Bommer replied, “as far as I know, we have not received these notifications.”