Coliseum dreaming: round 2.

Towering visions are dancing through the hands of the Metropolitan Transportation Association, the city and the state, thanks to nine development groups that have made proposals for the Coliseum site at Columbus Circle.

A long time ago, in a time that seems so far away, Moshe Safdie's futuristic nearly 100-story tower design for Boston Properties was supposed to signal the end of the 20th Century and bring the city closer to the visions of space age cartoonists.

Now, with that plan long dead - and with more realistic bids hundreds of millions of dollars less and a tower a third the size - the new Coliseum proposals for the most part are putting the focus on the activities inside the pedestal and not so much on the tower portion, with some exceptions.

The proposed buildings are evenly split between stone and glass faced. The stone ones have additional glass components in the base, and maintain the character of Central Park West's nearby residences. At least one, however, is a lean and mean glass triangulation, while another is a sparkling and melodious scheme. One has thin wings, another echoes nearby Lincoln Center. Some proposals have one tower, some up to three, and several rise to the full 750 feet.

Many have strong residential components, but remember, however, that residences in New York City do not generate large recurring property taxes. Condominiums, in fact, are scheduled for steep property tax cuts over the next two years.

The RFP limits the project to 2.1 million square feet, and while most of the developers have used this to the limit by building skyward, at least one project is about half of that size because it uses no towers higher than the current office site. That, of course, also limits the dollar bid.

'There are proposals for hotel portions and office portions, condo portions and rental portions.

Three developers plan space for an aquarium, while three others claim they have Sotheby's auction house as a tenant. A Sotheby's spokesperson notes that since the international attraction needs such amenities as high ceilings, and since they really want to be at the site, "what would be the point of putting all your eggs in one basket?"

Not to be left behind, sources say Sony, despite attaching its name to the Millennium Partners project, has also approached at least one other team to ensure it too gets to be in it to win it.

As Realtor Confucius says: He who wins bid will win tenants.

Plattner/Hines/Simon

Gerald Hines put a skating rink in the Galleria shopping mall in Houston 25 years ago, while shopping mall tycoon Mel Simon has pioneered environmentally-friendly retailers. Hines, quietly present in New York, was the co-developer of the Lipstick Building, 450 Lexington and currently is manager of 1585 Broadway and 750 Broadway for Morgan Stanley. They are also Amtrack's developer at the Farley Post Office. David Plattner has pricked the interest of these major U.S. real estate moguls to team up on this "edutainment" proposal.

Plattner is a soft spoken entrepreneur who has been Coliseum-dreaming for many years. The New Yorker has an extensive financing and entertainment venture background and has been devastated by stories characterizing him merely by a few offbeat experiences.

While holding high level positions in several financing and merchant banking firms, Plattner has worked on the syndication of commercial real estate throughout the United States and has been involved in investments in world stock markets and arbitrage for high net worth and pension fund clients. On the entertainment side, he has produced major rock concerts and musicals across the U.S., and provided consultation work on the design and implementation of Universal Studios in Florida, among other ventures.

His wife manages Cyndi Lauper, the Manhattan Transfer and Bobby McFerrin. The two have many entertainment industry contacts that are expected to be involved in the creative portions of the venue.

Their concept for the Coliseum site involves the adaptive reuse of most of the exhibit hall area. There will be an addition of three floors, totalling about 300,000 square feet, for convention and exhibit space, while Hines represents the group that would be bringing in the shows. Convention area was originally desired by New York City but was removed as a criteria from the final RFP in order to get the process going.

Working with Jaron Lanier, the Bay Area entertainment scientist who coined the term "virtual reality," Plattner plans to stretch the boundaries between retailing and educational entertainment. Together with Simon and Hines, the team is creating Discovery Circle as a destination playground for all ages.

Within the development there will be theme areas to on-site television shows and a small concert venue. From an aquarium on the bottom to a single floor entertainment destination on top, Discovery Circle is designed to stimulate the mind, body and wallet with futuristic technology. "One aquarium does not a responsible development make," said Jeff Spiritos, vice president of Hines. "It has to be put together with the other attractions that deliver on the same values, and retail and restaurants that are themed accordingly."

As a destination built with children in mind, repeat visits from tourists and natives - including the city's school children - are expected. Schools Chancellor Rudy Crew is among those who have already met with Plattner and Lanier.

The southern side will house a new, slender condominium tower rising up from the base and keeping the 59th Street corridor view open.

Sources indicate this is one of the lower bids because the full FAR of 2.1 million square feet is not used by the developers they only use 1.6 million square feet - even though long-term tax benefits and job creation may be greater than some of the other schemes.

We've seen the video and schematics, but as the design is becoming more contextual, it is still unavailable.

Handicap: low bid, most fun, jealous opponents. Can this get slipped into a higher bidder's building? Some have already tried.

Millennium Partners

The group that ate Lincoln Square is now Pac Manning its way southward to gobble up Columbus Circle. Many of the elements of the Lincoln Square building are being complimented and referred in a proposal that consists of two towers on a base housing a hotel, spa, residences and entertainment complex designed by Polshek & Partners LLP/Gary Edward Handel Associates.

The southern tower is slender and wing-like, the northern one more bulky, while the glass-fronted base is undistinguished.

A 140,000 square-foot Reebok spa will enhance the nearby sports club in Lincoln Square. Tennis courts and a pool will be located on the outdoor landscaped roof of the exhibition hall. From there, you can look down into the centerpiece, a 100-foot high atrium.

Westin Hotel & Resorts will be an investor in the project and its conference center takes center stage on the park side of the roof with a glass enclosed ballroom. Next to that is a restaurant that will be topped with a two-story glass-enclosed lobby reception area. On top of that is an architectural feature: a lighted glass disc.

The 1,000-room hotel will have 125,000 square feet, housing five ballrooms, restaurants and meeting space, much of it public space.

A new 20-story north tower, topping out at 282 feet, will be constructed on the top of the Exhibition Hall and will contain 450 hotel rooms.

The base of the existing south office tower will be converted to 550 hotel rooms and suites on floors 8-24. A new 25-68 floor addition will contain 500 condominium apartments and top out at the allowed 750 feet.

Below, in the exhibition hall, Sony Retail Entertainment will install a 250,000 square-foot multi-media retail restaurant and entertainment complex in the existing building that will be fronted by a 100-foot high glass Wintergarden enclosure. This goes up eight stories and culminates in a lighted disc at the rooftop.

The group has Whitehall Partners as backing, and remember, this is the Goldman Sachs clique that engineered the takeover of Rockefeller Center along with Tishman Speyer.

Handicap: One of the top contenders for content but hated by West Siders for making life crowded. But when did that ever stop them?

Tishman Speyer/The Mirage Corporation/Morgan Stanley

The folks that now manage Rockefeller Center have teamed here with Las Vegas gambling king Steve Wynn and investment bankers Morgan Stanley.

Architect Helmut Jahn has designed a multi-use facility with two new slender 41-story condominium towers that will rise from the top of the existing 26-story south-side office structure for a total of 67 stories. There will be a total of 800,000 square feet of offices.

The existing exhibition hall will be adapted for 50,000 square feet of retail, along with another 400,000 square feet that has Sotheby's name on it. Despite the Mirage involvement, no hotel is currently planned. The face of the building will be glass fronted and "angular."

They will also offer the community space to create a home for a museum, possibly the Museum of American Folk Art, that is currently housed on West 62nd Street nearby. The Museum did not return calls for comment. Speyer was in Japan, and Mirage referred all calls back to Speyer's spokesperson.

Handicap: Nothing special here and no design to see.

Larry Silverstein and Cousins MarketCenters

Silverstein is the well-respected city-based developer, owner and manager of office towers in New York - and has even branched out to other parts of the world, including Shanghai. He is also about to start building a huge residential project on 42nd Street. His partners, Cousins MarketCenters, are Atlanta developers.

The group's Kevin Roche-designed Coliseum proposal is a stunning three-towered mixed-use complex that will reuse the current office tower and exhibition hall. There will be 800,000 square feet of office, 800,000 square feet of luxury condos and 500,000 square feet of retail in the old Coliseum hall.

The project's higher northern spire will top off around 65 stories and will be "very close" to the 750 foot height limit. It is tall and glassy with setbacks at the top, but compliments the Trump project across the street. The southern and shorter old office tower retains its stone elements but is pepped up with a shimmering top and sunk into the new base, surrounded by beautiful columns and curved glass walls.

The airy design has curb appeal and cries out to have a blue sky in its background. But is grimy New York ready for such a clean and neat treat?

Inside will be restaurants, retail, and multi-screens, or as Silverstein says, "the normal chazarei," one creative element is an aquarium. "With a half million square feet there is an awful lot you can do," said Silverstein. "It will be a development that is reflective of the extraordinary quality of the location and its prominence and its visibility from such a broad part of the city. It's a remarkable opportunity to develop 2.1 million square feet in one of the best locations in the city, where mass transit is at the base of the property."

Handicap: Silverstein likes to bid conservatively but has a tip-top design.

Minskoff/LeFrak/DJL join as Coliseum Partners for The Coliseum Centre

The man that created a middle-income city is teaming up with a master of office towers and investment bankers Donaldson Lufkin Jenrette to bring Columbus Circle an $800 million project consisting of two classic towers on a 408,000 square-foot Sotheby's auction house base.

The all-new construction will also have 1,175,441 of rentable square feet in the office tower designed by Kolm Pederson Fox, which also handled the overall design. "This will be a smart building, a 1.250 millionsquare-foothigh-techstate-of-the-art efficient building," said Minskoff of the office portion.

The base echoes the design elements of nearby Lincoln Center, while the towers are each comprised of two different elements one echoing the base, the other a simple curtain wall - and break up the bulk by making each tower appear to be two different buildings altogether.

Gruzen Samton was design consultant on the residential tower housing 250 condominium apartments, 200,000 square feet of upscale retail, street-level townhouses and a four-star hotel.

Minskoff has a letter of commitment from Sotheby's and is not at all happy to hear they are scheming with other bidders. "Sotheby's said if we lose they would take it to the [other developers]," Minskoff explained. "We have detailed plans," he added, that include humongous elevators to carry tracks up to the appropriate selling floor where they can be unloaded. No loading docks to upset community residents here.

"This is a plan that is both user-friendly and community-friendly and gives New York significant economic benefits," said Minskoff, scoffing at competitor's plans that include large condominiums which he says pay little in taxes and employ few people.

Sotheby's brings visitors from all over the world that stay in hotels, eat in restaurants and spend money, Minskoff added, saying they have calculated the property will contribute $23 million in real estate taxes to the city each year, along with $63 million in local taxes.

Handicap: Scuttlebutt has it that LeFrak tends to be a low bidder. No drama here, but simple and contextual.

H.J. Kalikow & Co.

City-based developer Peter Kalikow sat on the MTA board and watched over multiple variations of Coliseum proposals throughout the years until his recent appointment by Governor Pataki as a director of the Port Authority.

Now, with some closure in sight, he has proposed a single, slender, right-angled triangular tower, designed by HLW International. It appears to be a green glass, curtain-walled building of 1.2 million square feet rising up from the south end of the site.

Dubbed The Center for Media and Global Communications, the tower is expected to contain "a major media and communications company and complimentary commercial tenants." There will also be luxury residential units.

The extensive base will house a retail center of over 500,000 square feet. It will be entered through a large public atrium which visually extends 59th Street into the building, and once inside, is surrounded by retail and TV studios.

A large, moving, old-fashioned clock tower will highlight the Circle-side facade, which will also feature a video wall.

Lehman brothers Holdings will provide the financing for the project.

Handicap: Can Kalikow get over former board membership and past the West Siders with vivid tower? May end up on short list as a courtesy and for creativity.

Related Companies & Himmel & Company

Developer Stephen Ross is one of the few that built his way through the bad market with a series of creatively financed residential developments, and is still going strong with projects commencing at Union Square, 89th Street and Amsterdam Avenue, Battery Park City, and 86th Street and Second Avenue.

Ken Himmel is the developer of Copely Plaza in Boston, Water Tower Place in Chicago, Reston Towne Center in Virginia, and is currently constructing Seattle Place, that will become a headquarters for Nordstrom and 400,000 square feet of multi-level retail.

They join here for a three tower proposal over a base of multiplex movies and studios. "Ours is a truly a mixed-use project," said Ross.

Designed by David Childs of Skidmore Ownings Merrill, who did the master plan for Riverside South, and Howard Elkus from Boston, Ross claims, "It's a West Side type of building."

One tower is totally condo, one totally rental and one totally hotel plus some condos.

The hotel will be the first in the city for Mandarin Oriental, a world leader for Five Star hotels. "It's the best hotel wherever they are," said Ross, who raved about the company's hotels in Hong Kong and San Francisco.

The centerpiece of the proposal, however, will be a huge rooftop globe containing a restaurant. "It's a 60-foot diameter glass globe that will be an icon for New York," said Ross. "It will have a restaurant inside and you can sit and enjoy views of Central Park and the city."

The base will contain 300,000 square feet of "specialty" retail, between 50,000 and 70,000 square feet of restaurants, and 100,000 square-feet of movies shown under the General Cinema banner.

Ross is speaking with well-known restaurateurs who do not yet have a New York presence, including Jeremiah Tower's Star Restaurant in San Francisco.

Additionally, there are 400,000 square feet of movie and TV studios. "Circle has part, and there will be other tenants in there as well," Ross said.

The Circle Entertainment Group, led by Steve Israel and architect partner Hans Knutzen, will be the primary studio complex operators. "We want to build the largest studio complex in the Northeast, with high-tech electronic studios," said Israel, who is not related to the former owner of One Times Square.

The 435,000 square feet of studios will have a separate entrance and have its own shop space, commissary and production areas. A 20,000 square-foot sound studio that can accommodate large orchestras will be run by Howard Schwartz Recording as the subtenant.

Israel operates SIE, a/k/a Steve Israel Enterprises, which is a full service post production and rental company that provides "concept to completion."

Also involved is Tech Effex, run by Dick Maitlan, who is the former head of sound effects for the Children's Television Workshop.

"We're not looking to reapportion any business, but want to look for new business," insisted Israel, allaying fears he will sink Silvercup, the Kaufman Astoria Studios and Chelsea Piers, most of which do not contain electronic facilities but merely "four walls." "We want to bring in the California business before it goes South and even the facilities that are already in existence would benefit," Israel said.

Kent Swig has been Circle's financial consultant.

Handicap: One of top entries. MTA insiders favor studios.

Forest City Ratner/Dan Brodsky/Peter Lehrer

Brooklyn-based Bruce Rather joins with West Side developer Daniel Brodsky and the former head of Lehrer McGovern Bovis for a mixed-use project with two apartment towers over a new retail base. Rather said he feels his proposal is "very creative."

Although Sears has been named a tenant, sources at Forest City admit they are still in talks with Nordstrom. The upscale retailer has been interested in what would be its first New York City location since the time an interim use was discussed several years ago. The two dynamically opposite retailers evidence the changing character of the neighborhood around the Coliseum, which is moving more towards upscale luxury even while the southern neighbors remain more middle and lower class.

Renowned architect Cesar Pelli has designed a nine-story base with all new construction. There will be restaurants, entertainment, an aquarium, and a state-of-the-art movie multiplex. The remainder of the 2.1 million square-foot complex is pretty evenly split between residential and retail. The 900 to 1,000 apartments will consist of both condos and rentals.

Handicap: Which retailer is right for Circle visitors? Some said this was the pick of the litter back in September, but pictures are worth 1,000 words. The sealed envelope please, backdated with the short list.

Trump with Colony Capital

Donald J. Trump has succeeded beyond anyone's wildest expectations in redeveloping the old Gulf and Western/Paramount Building to become the luxury condos and hotel condos of TIHT and achieving $1,000 a square foot prices right next door to the Coliseum.

His prices have driven the competing bidders to hope they too can attain close to that for their proposed units. But Trump says he really wants this project and has apparently outbid them all.

Sources say the Trump bid, around $270 million, is $60 million more than some of the others. That makes for a steep price to pay for the site, but don't be surprised if the MTA tries to make the eventual short-listed others match it.

Trump has proposed a single hotel building with a diagonal orientation on the southern side of the site. Designed by the noted architects, Robert A.M. Stern and Costas Kondylis, it gazes out over the Circle, and while facing TIHT and Central Park, leaves the view corridor open to 59th Street as the RFP desired. It is, however, one of the closest of the proposals in character to the granite buildings of Central Park West.

The exhibition hall rooftop is filled with gardens and there is a triangular atrium as well, while the base hall itself would house Sotheby's and/or other retailers.

Handicap: Can the politicians embrace Trump with open arms even as West Siders rant against Riverside South? They can't beat the success at TIHT, but will the Trump magic work across the street? High bidder is short-listed or sues.

Now if you took the Tromp bid, the Silverstein design, added Millennium's rooftop atriums, Related's global restaurant, fill the office tower with Kalikow's media tenant, and the base with Sotheby's and Plattner's Discovery Circle, New York City might have a winning combination.

What do you think? Let us know by e-mail to [e-mail] or at REW.