The Battery Park City Authority (BPCA) has negotiated an affordability agreement with the owners of the Gateway residential complex that limits rent increases for a dwindling number of longtime tenants for the next 43 years. Tenants in roughly 430 apartments who have lived continuously at the large complex since at least 2009 will be protected by an annual 2.5 percent cap on rent hikes through the year 2069, when the ground lease for Gateway expires.
Rosalie Joseph, co-president of the Gateway Tenants Association, said of residents protected by the new agreement, “it is this population that played such a vital role in building the Battery Park City community. Their hard work and dedication brought schools, a library, children’s programs, youth sports leagues and more.”
The six buildings of Gateway – three tall (seen here south of North Cove Marina) and three short – were the first residences to be populated in Battery Park City, in the early 1980s. Some residents have lived at Gateway for more than 45 years.
This agreement extends a prior accord, struck in 2020, which also capped increases at 2.5 percent, but only for a ten-year term. Gateway’s limit on rent jumps is almost exactly in line with the 2.49 percent historical average of increases approved by the City’s Rent Guidelines Board (RGB) for rent-stabilized apartments since 1996. That benchmark is directly relevant, because RGB increases once governed rent hikes allowed for all Gateway tenants. But that universality was eliminated in a 2009 agreement, which narrowed protections to only those tenants living in Gateway as of the date that deal went into effect. Everyone who came later was (and remains) subject to unlimited, market-rate increases.
The 2020 agreement which was due to expire in 2030 and has now been extended through 2069 (and which replaced RGB regulations with a flat 2.5-percent increase) has produced significant benefits for tenants relative to market-rate increases (which routinely double or triple the rent on a Gateway apartment when an affordable tenant moves out and that unit reverts to market rate), but a slight downside relative to the RGB regimen of increases that once governed the complex.
As a case in point, a hypothetical Gateway household (protected before 2020 by RGB-approved increases) that was paying $2,000 per month when the prior agreement came into effect and renewed its lease six times in the years since would now be paying $2,319 per month. But because increases authorized by the RGB between 2020 and today have lagged their longer-term historical trend (averaging at 2.0 percent, for this period, rather than 2.5 percent), the same tenant would today be paying $2,252 per month under the RGB terms in effect prior to 2020. This translates into a total extra cost of $2,696 for such a tenant since the 2020 agreement. (In practice, almost all Gateway apartments are priced at many times the illustrative $2,000 rent used here, so the actual variance would be significantly larger in most cases.)
Moreover, if promises by newly elected Mayor Zohran Mamdani to limit rent increases wherever possible are borne out, Gateway tenants may have reason to wish they were still governed by RGB-allowed rents. While the Mayor does not directly control Gateway or Battery Park City, he does have a significant influence over the community. City government is the ultimate recipient of BPCA extra revenue, and the Mayor is one of three officials (along with the Governor and the City Comptroller) whose approval is required for the BPCA’s budget and capital expenses. If Mayor Mamdani proves able to implement rent freezes for apartments governed by RGB limits, the gap between what Gateway’s rent-protected tenants will pay under the new agreement and the lesser amounts they would have paid (under the pre-2020 rules) may grow wider with each passing year.
One key goal long sought by affordability advocates has been achieved for the first time by the new agreement that the BPCA announced on Monday. In every prior case where the Authority negotiated with Gateway’s owners, tenant leaders had insisted that the length of time for which affordability protections applied should be no less than the term of any benefits that accrued the landlord. In previous agreements, such as those announced in 1995, 2005, 2009, and 2020, tenant protections were slated to endure for five to ten years, but the benefits to the landlord extended for decades into the future. In this instance, however, the 2069 sunset of limits on rent increases coincides with the current end date of Gateway’s ground lease.
An open question is whether the BPCA will extend that lease beyond 2069 (as it recently did for Brookfield Place, lengthening the term by 50 years), and if so, whether the Authority will insist that the landlord offer a similar extension of affordability protections to tenants. In practice, however, this question may be moot: Between 2009 and 2020, the number of rent-protected units in Gateway’s six buildings (which contain a total of 1,712 homes) fell to approximately 600 apartments, as longtime residents moved away (or, in some cases, died). In the interval since the 2020 agreement, that tally has further shrunk to 430 units, a decline of 28 percent in six years. If that rate of attrition continues, in 15 years (at the latest), there will be no remaining homes in Gateway subject to caps on rent increases. In this context, unless affordability criteria are expanded beyond the cohort of residents who moved in before 2009, no other terms are likely to matter very much.
The BPCA’s announcement makes no mention what benefits Gateway’s landlord may have received in exchange for accepting the new affordability protections. But it is clear that this arrangement will not cost the developer anything. A passage describing Gateway’s finances (and their impact on the Authority’s budget) from a 2025 BPCA bond prospectus explains, “in consideration of... limitations of rent increases... to the extent such limited rents are less than contemporaneous market rents... [the BPCA] shall provide [Gateway] with a credit or offset against Land Rent.” Effectively, this means that the BPCA is reimbursing the landlord for any rents not collected as a result of affordability protections.
The Gateway Tenants Association board of directors said, in a statement, “this victory sharpens our focus. With protections secured for the long term, we can now dedicate our full energy to advancing protections and improvements for market-rate tenants. Our attention and advocacy will be strong, unified, and strategic.” The group will host an online meeting on March 4, starting at 7pm, to discuss these developments further. (For more information, see the Gateway Tenants Association website here.)
Community Board 1 chair (and Gateway resident) Tammy Meltzer said, “preserving rent protections at Gateway Plaza is a major win for both residents and the broader Lower Manhattan community. Providing families with long-term certainty in their financial planning lifts a significant burden and reinforces the strength and stability in our neighborhoods. These residents have long been a foundational part of Battery Park City’s recovery and growth, and their continued presence will help ensure that its heart remains strong and vibrant for decades to come.”
BPCA board chair Don Capoccia said, “communities thrive at places like Gateway, and for more than four decades Gateway has been the residential anchor of Battery Park City.”
Built on landfill excavated from the construction of the World Trade Center, Battery Park City began to take shape in the early 1980s, starting with Gateway Plaza.
Authority president Raju Mann said of residents who will benefit from the new agreement, “each of them has called this neighborhood home for decades – they’ve raised families and built lives here. Now, extension of their rent protection can help keep them right here in Battery Park City for the long term.”
State Assembly member Charles Fall said, “in a housing market defined by rising costs, stability must be built into the policy itself. By locking in a 2.5-percent annual cap through 2069, this agreement transforms uncertainty into stability, delivering real, enforceable protections that keep our Gateway Plaza families in their homes and set a clear standard for how we safeguard housing in Lower Manhattan.”
City Council member Christopher Marte said, “Gateway is the foundation of Battery Park City’s residential community, and this agreement is a major victory for the long-time tenants who built their lives here. For decades, residents have fought to keep this neighborhood stable, affordable, and livable, and today we are protecting that legacy for the next generation. By capping rent increases and extending protections through 2069, we are giving families the certainty they deserve and ensuring that Battery Park City remains a place where working and middle-class New Yorkers can stay. This is what good public policy looks like when government listens to residents and puts community stability first.”
Tuesday’s announcement is the latest in a series of moves by the BPCA to preserve (and, in some cases, expand) local affordability. Last year, the Authority finalized an agreement related to Tribeca Bridge Tower (on North End Avenue), providing for 31 affordable units through 2069. And in 2022, the agency negotiated an agreement to maintain 70 affordable homes in Tribeca Pointe (on Chambers Street), also through 2069.
Matthew Fenton