Mayor de Blasio celebrates ground breaking at Dock 72 with Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corp.

Dock 72 - Brooklyn, NY

Bill de Blasio, Mayor of New York City

Brooklyn, NY The de Blasio administration and the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corp. joined partners Rudin Development, Boston Properties, Inc. and WeWork to break ground at Dock 72 recently, marking a major milestone in the 200-year history of the Brooklyn Navy Yard. The transformative, 675,000 s/f building will bring $380 million in private investment and 4,000 living wage jobs to the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Dock 72 will serve the rapidly emerging technology and creative industries in the borough, and the project will be one of the largest New York City commercial buildings to be constructed outside of Manhattan in decades.

“We are, quite literally, doubling down on good jobs at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. The 4,000 living wage jobs at Dock 72 are a key part of that commitment. This project is going to help bring ideas, innovators and start-ups to the yard, where they can scale up their businesses, hire more New Yorkers and manufacture their products right here in Brooklyn,” said mayor Bill de Blasio.

Combined with other major investments by the de Blasio administration, employment at the Brooklyn Navy Yard is poised to double by 2020 to more than 16,000 good-paying jobs.

Deputy mayor Alicia Glen; Rudin Development’s Partners Eric, Bill, Samantha and Michael Rudin; Boston Properties CEO Owen Thomas; WeWork co-founders Adam Neumann and Miguel McKelvey; and Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corp. chair Hank Gutman and president and CEO David Ehrenberg celebrated the groundbreaking at a ceremony held at the Brooklyn Grange.

Construction of the 16-story building began in 2016, with an anticipated tenant delivery in late 2017. In addition, the project will seek LEED certification. The site is centrally located within the Yard on a 60,000 s/f strip of land jutting out into the East River between two active dry-docks, offering panoramic views of the city and the activity of the Navy Yard. The building design created by S9 Architecture celebrates the surrounding maritime and industrial history of the Brooklyn Navy Yard and is designed to drive innovation and collaboration between tenants. The building will feature floor plates from 40,000 to 60,000 s/f, offering contiguous and easily devisable blocks of space for a variety of tenant sizes.

The construction of Dock 72 is part of the de Blasio administration’s efforts to support the growth of good-paying, modern industrial jobs. With this project, the Navy Yard now has over $700 million of construction activity underway or in the planning stages, with employment expected to more than double in the next few years, jumping from 7,000 to 16,000 by 2020. The Yard is also undergoing the creation and reactivation of over two million square feet of new space for manufacturers, creative, technology and other industrial companies across the 300 acre modern industrial park.

According to the agreement between the development team and BNYDC, all tenants in the building will pay a living wage to their employees, making it the first new development in Brooklyn with such a commitment. To ensure local residents benefit from the opportunities to be created, tenants will partner with the Brooklyn Navy Yard Employment Center to match nearby residents with job opportunities. BNYDC and the developers have also agreed to significantly expand BNYDC’s existing internship program. The developers will set aggressive goals for MWBE construction hiring and contracting.

WeWork is anchoring the new building with a 222,000 s/f lease, significantly reinforcing the Brooklyn Navy Yard as one of the largest concentrations of small and start-up businesses in the region. Highlights of the building’s 35,000 s/f amenity package curated by WeWork include a health and wellness center, specialty food and beverage offerings and a rooftop conference center.

For more information, please visit http://dock72.com/