Stuyvesant Town-Peter Cooper Village (colloquially StuyTown) is a monumental post-World War II housing complex located in New York City, on the East Side of Manhattan. This massive development consists of 11,250 flats in 55 brick apartment buildings, located on more than 32 hectares, from First Avenue to Avenue C, between 14th and 23rd Streets. It is divided into two parts. The buildings in Stuyvesant Town are named after Peter Stuyvesant, the last CEO of the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam, while Peter Cooper Village is named after the 19th century industrialist and philanthropist Peter Cooper. The complex exemplifies an innovative approach to urban planning and housing that aimed to meet the housing needs of a rapidly growing New York City.
The area in which the complex is located was once known as the Gas House District because of the numerous gas tanks that dominated the landscape. The district was predominantly inhabited by poor residents, including Irish, Germans, Jews, Slovaks and Armenians. Crime was common here and living conditions were difficult due to frequent gas leaks. After the FDR Drive was built and conditions improved in the late 1930s, the area began to change.
The neighbourhood in the 1930s Photo by Berenice Abbott, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
StuyTown was planned as early as 1942 as a post-war housing project. The complex was developed by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, which was modelled on the earlier Parkchester project in the Bronx. The project provided that veterans would be given priority in renting, which was intended to alleviate the post-war housing crisis. The first building opened in 1947 and soon afterwards the whole complex became hugely popular, attracting 100,000 applications from potential tenants in a matter of months. At the time, rents ranged from $50 to $91 per month, which was affordable for many middle-income New York families.
Stuyvesant Town-Peter Cooper Village was designed as a self-contained township, with numerous green spaces, playgrounds, sports fields and other amenities designed to create a comfortable and healthy living environment for its residents. Its spatial layout made up of brick blocks stands out urbanistically against the neighbouring compact, street-side development.
From its inception, Stuyvesant Town was controversial, mainly because of its numerous expropriations and racial discrimination in housing allocation. Frederick H. Ecker, president of Metropolitan Life, stated that “Negroes and whites don’t mix”, which led to the exclusion of African-Americans. Professor Lee Lorch of the City College of New York was at the forefront of the movement against this discrimination, which cost him his teaching position. In 1947, a court ruled that the project was private, allowing the company to discriminate against tenants at will.
In 2006, the complex was sold to Tishman Speyer Properties and BlackRock for $5.4 billion. However, in 2010, Tishman Speyer defaulted on its mortgage, which was the largest mortgage default in US history. In 2015, StuvyTown was sold to Blackstone Group LP and Ivanhoé Cambridge for approximately $5.3 billion, with New York City contributing $225 million to help keep parts of the complex affordable for low- and middle-income residents.
Today, Stuyvesant Town-Peter Cooper Village remains one of the largest private residential complexes in New York City. Although times have changed, the complex remains an important site on the Manhattan map, a testament to the social, economic and urban evolution of the city.
Source: stuytown.com
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