Here's a modest proposal that might get me laughed out of commercial real-estate journalism:
If construction of a new luxury apartment tower forces out modest little restaurants at their sidewalk level -- as is happening up and down Second Avenue on the Upper East Side, typical of many high-traffic Manhattan streets -- the subsequent new tower must also have modest little restaurants when they're completed. Even if it means giving rent breaks to cafe owners who couldn't otherwise afford to be there.
Otherwise, the developer will receive no zoning variance to build taller and larger (as many projects require) and no certificate of occupancy from the Buildings Department, which all require.
Wait! You ask: Shouldn't landlords have the right to rent out their retail space as they choose? Is free-market enthusiast Cuozzo suddenly calling for rent control or an unconstitutional "taking of property?"
Hardly. The zoning code is already complex enough to add a rule or two without turning the Big Apple into a Marxist re-education camp.
Current zoning rules go far beyond prohibiting Ferris wheels on Madison Avenue.
They're instruments of political and social engineering -- sometimes with welcome results, sometimes not.
They limit, for example, how many feet of street frontage stores may have on the Upper West Side -- a provision intended to keep out bank branches and large chain stores.
Large new buildings in the Theater District must reserve five percent of their space for entertainment-related uses and include lots of expensively mounted bright lights.
New apartment buildings must provide large numbers of parking spaces even as the city urges people to use mass transit rather than cars. Many Garment Center properties must devote a certain percentage of space to apparel-making uses -- even though there's almost no demand for any kind of apparel-making space in Manhattan these days.
But there is an immense and overwhelming demand for small restaurants of every cuisine on Second Avenue, as there is in many other neighborhoods undergoing large-scale redevelopment. There's every reason for the city to use its zoning powers to protect them.
Second Avenue on the Upper East Side still boasts myriad cuisine choices -- Italian, Japanese, Thai, Indian, Persian, Middle Eastern, and Chinese.
A Guatemalan/Mayan spot just replaced an Indian one, which had earlier replaced a Burmese one.
But for how long?
The eateries are an integral part of the neighborhood fabric.
People will spend millions of dollars for a condo apartment at Naftali Group's rising 255 E. 77th St., not for the dubious prestige of living on truck- and bus-congested Second Avenue, but to avail themselves of the (slowly dwindling) array of global tastes at their feet.
The coming of the Q subway line ignited a development boom.
Small corner buildings fall like dominos, or are about to fall, between East 67th and East 86th Streets. Most vulnerable are 19th-century tenements with low retail rents that owners of small Asian, South American, and Middle Eastern eateries can afford.
So many luxury towers are going up that Second Avenue could one day resemble increasingly sterile Third Avenue, where storefronts that were once home to small restaurants and shops are now filled with beauty salons, spas for humans and dogs, laser clinics, and walk-in medical offices.
Some years back, site-clearing for the luxury condo tower at the northwest corner of Second Avenue and East 74th Street swallowed up five popular eateries -- Italian, Irish, Afghan, Turkish, and Moroccan -- all at once.
Demolition plans for a project at East 77th Street ousted Japanese spot Sushi Hana and Hi-Life lounge. A more recent plan at East 73d Street chased out French bistro Jean Claude, Afghan Kebab House, and elegant Italian spot Il Divo.
A new tower at East 78th Street uprooted Sable's Smoked Fish and Lenwich sandwiches.
Next in the crosshairs is Vietnamese cafe Two Wheels at the East 71st Street west corner, where the small building's new owner has pushed one retail tenant after another.
Restaurant owners who want to stay in the neighborhood face a tough choice: either move to higher-rent Third Avenue, as Sable's and Lenwich did, or to lower-traffic First Avenue, as Zucchero e Pomodoro did, and closed within a year. Afghan Kebab just followed the Italian place to this possibly doomed location.
Even more galling, no construction has started at many sites where restaurants had to close.
They remain holes in the ground or empty of occupants as developers wait for construction loans.
Very few Second Avenue developers had the foresight and the means to rent precious sidewalk-level space to restaurants -- such as La Pecora Bianca at 1562 Second Ave. and Blue Mezze at 1480 Second Ave.
They're rare exceptions to the preference for bank branches, which pay astronomical rents and are regarded by landlords as "clean" uses that draw no vermin.
But the words of the prophets are written on the demolition notices.
The city should act before Second Avenue -- still Uptown's liveliest avenue for strolling and noshing -- is starved for places to eat.