An arresting sight greeted us Monday when we stopped by the South Street Seaport to check on the state of the Tin Building, which Howard Hughes Corp. had begun painstakingly dismantling inch by inch: no more Tin Building.
The decayed, landmarked structure finally came down in a few weeks ago, leaving lots of open sky between the FDR Drive and the new Pier 17.
Hughes plans to rebuild the Tin Building about 33 feet east of the old location, close to the pier’s west end. That will move it out of the floodplain and create breathing room between the structure and the highway trestle. Once reconstituted, it will house a big seafood marketplace to be run by Jean-Georges Vongerichten.
But the project had to overcome numerous engineering challenges and required a slew of environmental reviews. The born-again Tin Building is to open at some point in 2020.