Mayor Michael Bloomberg has chosen Dutch engineering firm Arcadis to conduct a feasibility study for the development of Seaport City, a new waterfront neighborhood Bloomberg has proposed for Lower Manhattan. Bloomberg planned the development as part of a sweeping plan to protect New York City from future hurricanes. The enclave, which would front on the East River, will be modeled after Battery Park City, which withered Hurricane Sandy virtually unscathed, according to reports.
Arcadis has worked on similar studies for clients that include the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and the Dutch city of Rotterdam. The firm also helped build flood protections in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.
The Seaport City project is expected to cost billions, but given the stakes, the city needed a “bigger, bolder solution,” Daniel Zarilli, the city’s first-ever director of resiliency, told the New York Daily News.
Arcadis is being asked to help determine the size and shape of the development, and brainstorm ways to make the project financially self-sustaining, Zarilli told the newspaper. [NYDN] — Hiten Samtani