Tower 270 (also known as 270 Broadway, Arthur Levitt State Office Building, 80 Chambers Street, and 86 Chambers Street) is a 28-story mixed use building in the

Civic Center A civic center or civic centre is a prominent land area within a community that is constructed to be its focal point or center. It usually contains one or more dominant public buildings, which may also include a government building. Recently, the ...

and

Tribeca Tribeca (), originally written as TriBeCa, is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan in New York City. Its name is a syllabic abbreviation of "Triangle Below Canal Street". The "triangle" (more accurately a quadrilateral) is bounded by Canal Stre ...

neighborhoods of

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. Completed in 1930 to designs by E.H. Faile & Company, it has of floor space, on a plot with facing

Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street **Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...

to the east and on Chambers Street to the north. Tower 270 is just west of

New York City Hall New York City Hall is the Government of New York City, seat of New York City government, located at the center of City Hall Park in the Civic Center, Manhattan, Civic Center area of Lower Manhattan, between Broadway (Manhattan), Broadway, Park R ...

, near several other structures, including the Broadway–Chambers Building,

280 Broadway 280 Broadway – also known as the A.T. Stewart Dry Goods Store, the Marble Palace, and the Sun Building – is a seven-story office building on Broadway, between Chambers and Reade Streets, in the Civic Center neighborhood of Lower Manhattan i ...

, and the

Tweed Courthouse The Tweed Courthouse (also known as the Old New York County Courthouse) is a historic courthouse building at 52 Chambers Street (Manhattan), Chambers Street in the Civic Center, Manhattan, Civic Center of Manhattan in New York City. It was ...

. It housed the first headquarters of the

Manhattan Project The Manhattan Project was a research and development undertaking during World War II that produced the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the United States with the support of the United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the project w ...

in 1942–43.

History

The building was erected in 1930 on the southwest corner of Chambers Street and

by developer Robert E. Dowling at a cost of $2.5 million. It was designed E.H. Faile & Company, and replaced the headquarters of

Chemical Bank Chemical Bank was a bank with headquarters in New York City from 1824 until 1996. At the end of 1995, Chemical was the third-largest bank in the U.S., with about $182.9 billion in assets and more than 39,000 employees around the world. Beginning ...

(which had been built in 1907 to replace a building opened in 1850).

The Manhattan Project

The building's location gave its name to the

, which during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

developed the

atomic bomb A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission (fission bomb) or a combination of fission and fusion reactions (thermonuclear bomb), producing a nuclear explosion. Both bomb ...

, and whose first headquarters were on the 18th floor. At the time, in 1942, it was a federal office building, where the

North Atlantic Division The North Atlantic Division of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is one of the eight permanent divisions within the Corps. Made up of roughly 3,500 employees in six districts and a Division headquarters, the North Atlantic Division is a major ...

of the

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers , colors = , anniversaries = 16 June (Organization Day) , battles = , battles_label = Wars , website = , commander1 = ...

was located. The Corps was to coordinate all United States military construction in the Northeast as well as all of

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

, and it provided administrative support for the project. The name initially proposed was "Laboratory for the Development of Substitute Materials". Fearing the name would draw undue attention, the project's military leader, General

Leslie Groves Lieutenant General Leslie Richard Groves Jr. (17 August 1896 – 13 July 1970) was a United States Army Corps of Engineers officer who oversaw the construction of the Pentagon and directed the Manhattan Project, a top secret research project ...

, changed it to "Manhattan Engineer District", which was eventually shortened to Manhattan Project. Coordination for the project moved to

Oak Ridge, Tennessee Oak Ridge is a city in Anderson and Roane counties in the eastern part of the U.S. state of Tennessee, about west of downtown Knoxville. Oak Ridge's population was 31,402 at the 2020 census. It is part of the Knoxville Metropolitan Area. Oak ...

in 1943, but the name stuck.

Post World War II

After the war, the building was acquired by the

State of New York New York, officially the State of New York, is a state in the Northeastern United States. It is often called New York State to distinguish it from its largest city, New York City. With a total area of , New York is the 27th-largest U.S. state ...

for $3.7 million. "Master builder"

Robert Moses Robert Moses (December 18, 1888 – July 29, 1981) was an American urban planner and public official who worked in the New York metropolitan area during the early to mid 20th century. Despite never being elected to any office, Moses is regarded ...

had one of his three offices in the building. It became the

Arthur Levitt Arthur Levitt Jr. (born February 3, 1931) is the former Chairman of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). He served from 1993 to 2001 as the twenty-fifth and longest-serving chairman of the commission. Widely hailed as a c ...

State Office Building providing New York City offices for members of the

New York State Assembly The New York State Assembly is the lower house of the New York State Legislature, with the New York State Senate being the upper house. There are 150 seats in the Assembly. Assembly members serve two-year terms without term limits. The Assem ...

and

New York State Senate The New York State Senate is the upper house of the New York State Legislature; the New York State Assembly is its lower house. Its members are elected to two-year terms; there are no term limits. There are 63 seats in the Senate. Partisan com ...

. In 2000 it was sold for $33.6 million in a

sealed bid Seal may refer to any of the following: Common uses * Pinniped, a diverse group of semi-aquatic marine mammals, many of which are commonly called seals, particularly: ** Earless seal, or "true seal" ** Fur seal * Seal (emblem), a device to imp ...

transaction that at the time was the highest-valued property sale ever consummated by the State of New York. The building is owned by RAL Companies of

Hempstead, New York The Town of Hempstead (also known historically as South Hempstead) is the largest of the three Administrative divisions of New York#Town, towns in Nassau County, New York, Nassau County (alongside North Hempstead, New York, North Hempstead and Oys ...

, of which Robert A. Levine is the principal. Mark Groblewski of RAL was the only civilian given direct access to 270 Broadway, 86 Chambers Street, and 80 Chambers Street to continue construction in these buildings, in the restricted area surrounding

Ground Zero In relation to nuclear explosions and other large bombs, ground zero (also called surface zero) is the point on the Earth's surface closest to a detonation. In the case of an explosion above the ground, ''ground zero'' is the point on the ground ...

, after the

September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercia ...

. Groblewski also worked as a civilian volunteer assisting and directing industrial earth-moving equipment at Ground Zero. Floors 16 to 28 were converted to 39 condominium apartments in 2003 ranging in size from . Floors 2 through 7 comprise office space and 48 rental apartments occupy floors 8 through 15. The office space entrance is at 86 Chambers Street, and there are two residential entrances – on Broadway for the condominiums and on Chambers Street for the rental apartments.

References

{{Tribeca, Manhattan Office buildings in Manhattan United States Army Corps of Engineers Manhattan Project sites 1930 establishments in New York City Buildings and structures completed in 1930 Broadway (Manhattan) Tribeca Civic Center, Manhattan