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Essex Crossing is a mixed-use development in New York City's Lower East Side, at the intersection of Delancey Street and Essex Street just north of Seward Park. Essex Crossing will comprise nearly of space on and will cost an estimated . Part of the existing Seward Park Urban Renewal Area (SPURA), the development will sit on a total of nine city blocks, most of them occupied by that replaced razed in 1967.
Essex Crossing, approved on the site of the Seward Park Urban Renewal Area, was developed by Delancey Street Associates (a joint venture of L+M Development Partners, BFC Partners, and Taconic Investment Partners). SHoP Architects and Beyer Blinder Belle designed the master plan. The development has over 1,000 housing units, including affordable housing and senior housing; commercial venues such as a bowling alley, food hall, cinema, and museum; and of publicly accessible open space. The plan was presented to the public in September 2013 by then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg, as a compromise solution after decades of political disagreements over the site.
Construction on the project began in 2015,Garfield, Leanna (April 6, 2017) "11 billion-dollar mega-projects that will transform New York City by 2035" Business Insider and the first phase of the project was completed in 2018.
In 1967, New York City leveled 20 acres on the southern side of Delancey Street and removed more than 1,800 low-income, largely Puerto Rican families, with a promise that they would return to new low-income apartments when they were built. However, political corruption abounded, and the new apartments were never built. The competing forces within the neighborhood debated whether the SPURA area should be used to develop affordable housing within Manhattan Community Board 3; or be developed as mixed-use – low- and middle-income as well as commercial; or whether it should be all large commercial retail use. During the Edward Koch administration that ended in 1989, the city contracted with Sam LeFrak to build, but massive divided opposition caused it to be withdrawn.
In January and February 2011, the local community board took the issue of SPURA's development up and came to a community consensus that the area will be built to accommodate mixed use of low-income housing, commercial properties/retail spaces, and market-value homes. The Board, community and city planners and public officials were to finalize the plans for development. On October 11, 2012, the New York City Council approved the project, then still referred to as SPURA, in a unanimous vote. On September 18, 2013, the then Mayor Michael Bloomberg unveiled a definite plan for the Essex Crossing project. Delancey Street Associates—composed of L+M Development Partners, BFC Partners, and Taconic Investment Partners—were selected develop the site. The consortium was required to develop at least 1,000 apartments, including at least 500 affordable housing units, and they were required to set aside some units for families displaced by SPURA.
Delancey Street Associates obtained $250 million in construction loans in July 2015, allowing work to begin on the first phase of the project the same month. That December, Delancey Street Associates obtained a further $79.5 million loan to develop Site 6 and a $95 million loan for Site 1. An affordable housing lottery for the first building, 242 Broome Street, was launched in 2016, followed by lotteries for the Frances Goldin Senior Apartments and The Essex the next year. The final first-phase building, The Essex, topped out in October 2017. The housing lotteries saw high demand; one of the lotteries attracted 60,000 applications for 99 units, while another lottery attracted 93,000 applications for 104 apartments. The first residents began moving into the development in November 2017, The Frances Goldin Senior Apartments, which formally opened in January 2018, was the first building in the development to be completed, and the first phase's other three buildings opened over the subsequent months.
Delancey Street Associates announced plans in February 2017 to increase the number of affordable and market-rate apartments at Essex Crossing, and it presented renderings of sites 3 and 4 to the public later that year. A public park designed by West 8 was completed in June 2019, and a lottery for 140 Essex Street opened that month. By then, one report estimated that Essex Crossing accommodated half a million daily visitors, about the same number as in the much larger Hudson Yards development on Manhattan's West Side. The housing lottery for the Artisan at 180 Broome Street was launched in March 2020, and leasing at that building commenced that August. Verizon leased office space at the development in 2021 but never moved in, instead subleasing it.
The developers refinanced the development in 2022 with a $466 million loan. In 2024, Taconic sold of office space at 180 Broome Street and 202 Broome Street to Deutsche Bank. The next year, the Rosenkranz Foundation bought two of the office condos at 202 Broome Street. In addition, plans for a cultural venue known as Canyon were announced for Essex Crossing in mid-2025; the venue would open in 2026.
In September 2013, it was announced that the market would be integrated into the Essex Crossing. The new building, along Essex Street on the south side of Delancey, will have 39 stalls and two restaurants. It was originally planned to open in 2018, but was later pushed back to May 2019. Essex Market formerly had an additional food market known as the Market Line, which opened in November 2019 and closed in April 2025.
The large trolley terminal under Delancey and Essex streets sat unused for 60 years and became the location for a proposed park. The project, known as Lowline, was first proposed in 2011; the next year, it successfully raised over $150,000 from 3,300 backers on Kickstarter to create a full-scale exhibition of the solar lighting technology. If completed, it would have been within the Essex Crossing development, though the project was indefinitely postponed in February 2020 due to a lack of funding and was considered in the planning stages as of 2021. The Market Line space occupies part of where Lowline was supposed to be built.
On the southern side of Delancey Street is the Park at Essex Crossing, designed by West 8. The park includes a playground, benches, and plantings that were once native to New York City.
At site 2 on 115 Delancey Street (125 Essex Street) is The Essex, a 24-story structure designed by Handel Architects, with 195 rental apartments In October 2014, a movie theater, with 14 screens, was announced. Located in the Essex building and operated by Regal Cinemas, it includes digital cinema projectors and with padded footrests, among other amenities, as well as an Regal Cinemas Regal Premium Experience auditorium and bar. Scheduled to begin construction in spring 2015 for completion by 2018, the theater opened on April 6, 2019. The sixth floor has a urban farm that opened in August 2019.
Site 5 at 145 Clinton Street contains the Rollins, a 15-story structure designed by Beyer Blinder Belle, with 211 rental apartments. The building is named because it stands on a site where the saxophonist Sonny Rollins formerly lived. Trader Joe's opened a location on the first floor and basement of 145 Clinton Street, at the northwest corner with Grand Street, on October 19, 2018. The space on the building's second floor, immediately above Trader Joe's, is occupied by a Target store, which opened in August 2018.
Site 6 at 175 Delancey Street is occupied by The Goldin, a 14-story structure designed by Dattner. The building is also known as the Frances Goldin Senior Apartments and has 99 apartments, all of which are for senior citizens. There is also a senior center in the building, which serves residents of both The Goldin and 140 Essex Street.
One of these buildings will also include Canyon, a combined museum and performing-arts center designed by New Affiliates Architecture. Canyon would include of exhibition space, a 300-seat performance hall, and a piazza.
, two additional buildings were planned as part of an unbuilt third phase:
In 2016, the Children's Museum of Manhattan announced plans to relocate to Essex Crossing. The museum planned to occupy , but these plans were canceled the next year due to financial and logistical conflicts.
Rapfogel and Silver were accused of promoting specific plans for favored developers, which would maintain the area's Jewish identity, at the expense of other communities. They opposed a 1970s plan for affordable housing, which would have changed the demographics of the neighborhood and brought in more Chinese and Hispanic residents. Silver instead proposed a shopping center with no housing for the site in the 1980s. In the 1990s, they proposed a “big box” store, like Costco, to be built by Bruce Ratner, a developer. Ratner hired Rapfogel's eldest son in 2007, and Silver employed Rapfogel's wife as his chief of staff. Ratner also helped raise $1 million for the Met Council.
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