August 28, 2017 Real Estate

For the third year in a row, I walked every block in Tribeca, counting storefronts that appeared to be available. In 2015, there were 100; in 2016, there were 127. This year, I found 134*—not as bad as I feared, but not exactly a turning of the tide.

The knee-jerk reaction is to blame landlords for expecting more than the market can bear, and there are certainly many examples of businesses that would’ve liked to stay in the neighborhood, but they couldn’t find affordable space. The bigger issue, however, is that people just don’t shop the way they used to. We can beg each other to patronize local shops instead of buying everything online, but no one ever got rich expecting people to do the right thing for someone else.

As developer Billy Macklowe said in April, “I think retail is fucked, plain and simple.”

What will become of street-level Tribeca? We have a glut of vacant street-level real estate that has been valued based on outdated norms, and I can’t see a future where it’s worth what it once was. Even if a serious contraction were to dramatically lower rent, are there enough businesses that could thrive here? I wouldn’t bet on it. The low density that makes living here so lovely is brutal for businesses.

We’ll always need some retail businesses, of course: The self-care industries—fitness, skincare, cosmetics, etc.—continue to invest in the neighborhood; preschools and other services aimed at young children appear to be doing well; restaurants should be able to survive, if the city and state don’t regulate them to death. And industries currently being squeezed out—such as parking—might find a way back in. Some storefronts could be converted to residential, although at a substantial financial loss. In general, however, I honestly don’t know what can be done with so much unnecessary commercial real estate.

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*Methodology is the same as in previous years. The area surveyed is bounded by Canal, Broadway, Murray, and West. I did not include the following: spaces where we know something is coming; not-yet-built buildings where the amount of retail is unknown; pop-ups and other temporary retail (such as condo sales offices); or anything on Canal, because that’s an entirely different ecosystem from the rest of Tribeca—although it too is decimated, especially the north side. And the year-over-year numbers aren’t perfect, because I’m not rigorous about making sure that I counted a vague space—such as the southwest corner of Broadway and Reade—the way I did before. I’ve organized the photos below into quadrants, mostly for my own convenience, so please don’t get hung up on whether you think an area is appropriately defined.

Northeast Tribeca

Southeast Tribeca

Southwest Tribeca

Northwest Tribeca