Bruce Mosler, Chairman of Global Brokerage at Cushman & Wakefield, discusses his real estate outlook and addresses New York City’s office vacancy problem in Claman Countdown.
New York City’s business districts are still a third less busy than they were before the pandemic, according to a new study. That makes the Big Apple’s downtown recovery from the COVID crisis among the worst among America’s largest cities.
An analysis conducted by the University of Toronto found that pedestrian traffic in New York City’s Midtown and Lower Manhattan neighborhoods is just 66% of 2019 levels. That puts the city’s recovery rate at the bottom of the rankings, in line with other cities that have struggled to bring workers back to their downtown areas.
Pedestrians cross a street past traffic in New York City’s Midtown neighborhood on Saturday, June 17, 2023. (Michael Nagle/Bloomberg via Getty Images / Getty Images)
New York City’s 33% drop in pedestrian traffic resulted in the city’s recovery rate ranking 54th out of the 66 cities surveyed. By comparison, San Francisco, California – with a downtown area that has had a notoriously difficult time recovering from the COVID crisis – ranked higher, with a 67% recovery in foot traffic.
UBER and LYFT will pay $328 million to settle with New York AG and James over wage theft allegations
“We’ve been tracking this since early 2022, and New York was an early comeback story — but then stalled,” Karen Chapple, director of the University of Toronto’s School of Cities, told the New York Post, which first reported the analysis reported. “Part of this is due to commercial office tenants gradually exiting their leases,” Chapple said.
People walk on the sidewalk of Fifth Avenue in New York City, USA on September 16, 2023. (Thomas Trutschel/Photothek via Getty Images / Getty Images)
The City of New York Partnership, which represents some of Wall Street’s biggest giants, disputed the accuracy of the University of Toronto’s analysis.
Remote work costs NYC over $12 billion annually: report
The organization’s CEO, Kathryn Wylde, told The Post that in New York, “there are business districts in the five boroughs that are likely to see an increase in foot traffic due to work from home… So I don’t think so.” [New York’s] The comparison with smaller cities with a single “downtown” is fair.”
FOX Business’ Lydia Hu speaks with Michael Rudder, principal of Rudder Property Group, about New York City’s office vacancy rates on “The Big Money Show.”
The university’s analysis found the city with the worst downtown recovery post-COVID is St. Louis, Missouri, where foot traffic was just 53% of 2019 levels, followed by Louisville, Kentucky, at 54%, and Minneapolis , Minnesota. at 56%.
GET FOX BUSINESS ON THE GO by CLICKING HERE
The city with the best recovery was Las Vegas, Nevada, the only city in the rankings that had higher downtown foot traffic than before the pandemic, at 103%.