First New US Telecom Hotel to Arise on West Side

As the Internet and telecommunications companies have grown over the past several years, buildings have been retrofitted to house the computers, switches and routers that keep Web users connected. But, a new six-story building to be erected by the Durst Organization on the block bounded by 11th and 12th Avenues and 57th and 58th Streets may be the first of its kind. So says Robert Stella, senior vice president of CB Richard Ellis, which will lease the building. “Most of what’s out there are retrofits of buildings designed 30 to 60 years ago. As far as we know, there’s no other building in a major downtown CBD that been built for this purpose,” he says.

NYCyberCenter, as the half-million-sf facility will be known, is being tailored to fit the needs of telecom firms with reinforced floors, redundant service elevators and extra-high ceilings. Demolition of existing structures is scheduled to begin next June, with completion of the center slated for July 2002.