Episcopal Church Encounters Opposition to Apartment Plan in Chelsea
By GABRIELLE BIRKNER
Staff Reporter of the Sun
January 23, 2007

Neighbors are vowing to fight the construction of a 15-story apartment tower in Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood on the campus of the General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church, which says the building is needed to raise funds to keep the seminary operating in New York City.

The seminary has already scaled back its proposal to build a cooperative apartment tower, but some neighbors say the proposed housing complex is still too large and too contemporary to inhabit Chelsea's historic district.

The 19th-century seminary has fallen into disrepair, and church officials say that selling their development rights will help fund building restoration and maintenance. If the institution fails to raise tens of millions of dollars in short order, the institution will have to leave Chelsea, the seminary's dean, Ward Ewing, told about 250 people who came to last night's Community Board 4 meeting at the Hudson Guild – Fulton Center on Ninth Avenue. the rest