New York City is holding a competition to create affordable housing on some of its most difficult properties.

The program, called Big Ideas for Small Lots NYC, will partner with the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects to select designs for lots as narrow as 13 feet wide, with areas as small as 1,008 square feet. The tiniest sites the city typically deals with are 25 feet wide by 100 feet deep, or 2,500 square feet — the size of many townhouse lots. The properties, mostly wedged between residential buildings, are in all five boroughs.

A narrow vacant lot on West 136th Street in Harlem, where feral cats have taken up residence
A narrow vacant lot on West 136th Street in Harlem, where feral cats have taken up residence © Andrea Mohin/The New York Times

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While the competition is relatively small scale, the department hopes it will have an outsize effect on neighborhoods.

“It’s really important to have continuity on the block,” said Hayes Slade, a partner at Slade Architecture and the president of the American Institute of Architects’ New York chapter, who is one of the jurors. A vacant lot in the middle of the block is “like missing teeth,” she said, and the competition aims to fill those gaps.

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The department may consider co-living or micro-unit arrangements, but it is mostly anticipating plans for two- or three-family homes for buyers selected through the affordable housing lottery, although income limits have not been established yet. Below-market-rate rentals are also being considered.

Some in the community are apprehensive, as they have seen city-subsidized developments, on larger lots, that they believe neglected the needs of longtime residents, said Paula Z. Segal, a senior staff attorney for the Community Development Project's Equitable Neighborhoods practice.

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