The New York School Construction Authority plans to convert the lower six floors and cellar of the 95,000-sq-ft, 14-story New York Foundling Hospital’s Manhattan building, built in 1988, into a new public school. Upon scheduled completion in September 2014, Public School 340, located at the corner of the Avenue of the Americas and 17th Street, will serve 518 students in levels pre-K through fifth grade. Rendering courtesy of Mdszerbaty Associates Architecture PS 340 The school will occupy the lower six floors of the 14-story building. Construction is scheduled to begin in the summer of 2012. The project is in the

SnapShot  June 6, 2011 Submitted By: Ben Heckscher, Freelance Photographer, The Launch Box Blog, New York “Shooting in black and white, I felt, would allow me to focus on the shape and form of what has been photographed without being distracted by color,” says Heckscher. He took this shot of the Second Avenue Subway tunnel-boring machine near 92nd Street with a Canon PowerShot G11 camera at f2.8 and a Manfrotto monopad. Using a flash was prohibited so as not to disturb the sandhogs starting the machine's second drive. Photographer: Ben Heckscher

On The Scene   June 6, 2011 Thornton Tomasetti Thornton Tomasetti held its 2011 Annual Meeting at Baruch College in New York on May 12. The meeting included a session in which the firm’s designers from around the country each gave a five-minute presentation on projects they have been working on during the past year. From left: Jonatan Schumacher, integration engineer, New York; Dan Swiatek, senior engineer, Chicago; Robert Rogers, senior engineer, Dallas; Snehal Kadam, senior engineer, Kansas City, Mo.; Matt Steiner, senior project manager, Irvine, Calif.; Ben Varela, project engineer, Los Angeles; Joelle Nelson, project director, New York; and Austin

Queens Rendering Courtesy of NYCEDC Willets Point The 12.7-acre phase-one plan of the Willets Point project is expected to create 1,800 permanent jobs and 4,600 construction jobs. Rendering Courtesy of MDSzerbaty Associates Architecture PS 340 The school will occupy the lower six floors of the 14-story building. Construction is scheduled to begin in the summer of 2012. NYCEDC Issues RFPs for Willets Point ProjectPhase one of the long-delayed 62-acre Willets Point redevelopment project in Queens, N.Y., took a step forward with the New York City Economic Development Corp.'s May 9 call for proposal requests.NYCEDC sent RFPs to a group of

ArtBridge, an organization that helps transform scaffolding or sidewalk bridges into temporary outdoor art exhibits, announced a call for entries for its Brooklyn installation, Works in Progress. Artists can submit visual art that will be enlarged and displayed on the 400-ft sidewalk bridge on Flatbush Avenue on the South Side of the Atlantic Yards Development.ArtBridge installations aim to give up-and-coming artists exposure and to liven up the nearly 1-million linear ft of scaffolding across New York City. Brooklyn-based artists have up to one month to submit visual work that somehow references the artistic process. A team of curators will then

Salmar Properties, New York was selected to develop Federal Building #2, a vacant, 1.1 million-sq-ft warehouse building in Sunset Park, into a state-of-the-art industrial center. The selection was announced by the New York City Economic Development Corporation, along with Congressman Jerrold Nadler and Congresswoman Nydia M. Velázquez. Map Courtesy of NYCEDC The project will be consistent with the Sunset Park Waterfront Vision Plan for a modern industrial waterfront that is also environmentally sustainable and is expected to create 1,300 permanent industrial jobs and 400 construction jobs. The federal building development project is also part of Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s Waterfront Vision

$161.5 million in federal funding is being given to New Jersey during 2011 for beach replenishment, flood mitigation and harbor maintenance projects across the state. The funds will come from the Fiscal Year 2011 Continuing Resolution, which was passed by congress in April, and is being received by the Army Corps of Engineers whose funding is typically provided by the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee in Energy and Water Development. For beach replenishment, $7.5 million will go to Monmouth Beach, $7.6 million will go to Long Beach Island, $11.9 million will go to Atlantic City and Ventnor, $10.3 million will go to

The New York School Construction Authority is planning the conversion of the lower six floors and cellar of the 95,000-sq-ft, 14-story New York Foundling Hospital�s Manhattan building, first built in 1988, into a new public school. Public School 340, located at the corner of the Avenue of Americas and 17th Street will serve 518 students in levels Pre-K through fifth grade upon its completion in September 2014. Rendering Courtesy Of MDSzerbaty Associates Architecture The project is in the design stages with MDSzerbaty Associates Architecture of New York as lead architect and will include 21 new classrooms on the 17th Street

Phase one of the long-delayed 62-acre Willets Point redevelopment project in Queens, N.Y., reached the proposal stage with the New York City Economic Development Corporation’s call for request for proposals. RFPs were sent to the group of 29 developers that answered its request for qualifications in 2009. NYCEDC asked the group to form teams and create a development proposal that will be due on August 12, 2011. The 12.7-acre phase one plan includes up to 68,000 sq ft of retail space, up to 400 housing units—35% of which will be qualified as affordable—a hotel, two acres of open space and

Construction on the $27 million New York Langone Medical Center’s Hospital for Joint Diseases project which includes the modernization of three outpatient facilities, the modernization of six floors within the hospital for joint diseases and the relocation of medical programs, patient services and staff from the RUSK Institute of Rehabilitative Medicine to their new venues is currently under way. Gardiner & Theobald of New York is managing the multi-story re-stack of existing services, the upgrade of mechanical systems and the ancillary facilities that will receive the Rusk Pavilion, the center for rehabilitative medicine that is currently housed on the main