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QUESTION

How will the proposed zoning changes protect residents from excessive noise if commercial uses are allowed on upper floors of residential buildings?

1:30:59

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The Department of City Planning explains that the proposed zoning changes include measures to protect residents from excessive noise from commercial uses on upper floors.

Businesses locating on upper floors must meet sound attenuation standards before being allowed to operate in the space
Businesses must either separate commercial space from residential by at least 15 feet or have a sound engineer certify sufficient soundproofing
The soundproofing must ensure noise does not rise above the ambient sound level
These requirements are built into the zoning proposal itself and must be met to obtain a Certificate of Occupancy

Joann Ariola

1:30:59

If you allow commercial use above residential, And let's say it's light manufacturing business, which I'd like you to clarify what you consider that on top of two floors that are apartments, Would not affect the quality of life of the residents?

1:31:12

What about the noise, the constant movement?

1:31:14

I mean, even if it is a shop that's creating clothing with with sewing machines going all day long, wouldn't that affect the quality of life of the people living below?

Dan Garodnick

1:31:24

It's a great question, and I'm gonna have Matt jump in in a second.

1:31:27

One thing that I will note is that a lot of the individual home occupation uses that you're describing are already allowed as home occupations under the New York City zoning resolution.

1:31:43

What we are proposing is to enable the ones that for reasons which no longer make any sense are strictly prohibited to things like the interior decorator, the lawyer, the barber.

1:31:56

But most importantly, in the context of stacking commercial over residential.

1:32:03

That only works in a building where you can have physical separation between the commercial and the residential spaces, which means it does not work in every building.

1:32:13

There are places where that would functionally not be possible.

1:32:16

You need to have separation, either a separate elevator bank, separate access with stairs, etcetera.

1:32:22

But I do want Matt to talk about the environmental issues here as to how to protect residences in this case.

Matt Waskiewicz

1:32:27

Sure.

1:32:28

Thank you, council member, for the questions that you're you're raising and we we ask ourselves the same ones.

1:32:32

Which is why in crafting this proposal, we made sure that if any business is going to locate on an upper floor, they have to meet sound attenuation standards before they're even allowed to to locate in that space.

1:32:44

So they either have to separate by at least 15 feet or they have to have a sound engineer sign off that they've provided enough soundproofing so that whatever they're doing in that space, it's not rising above the ambient level of sound.

1:32:56

And that's before they can even start their operation, get that CFO in order to to begin.

1:33:01

So that's in built into the zoning itself.

Joann Ariola

1:33:04

Right.

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