#Bloomberg Administration London Envy Softens—City Planning Withdraws East Midtown Upzoning

"Key members of the Council said on Tuesday that the proposal — to rezone a 73-block area into a district of sleek glass towers that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said would make New York competitive with London and other world-class cities—" New York Times: End of Proposal to Raise Skyline on the East Side

The Shard—Europe's Tallest Building—pointed to by supporters of the East Midtown upzoning as the type of iconic building New York needs.The office space has no tenants, and all the apartment buyers have been absentee investors from other countries. Eighty percent of The City is owned by foreign speculators, and Britons are responsible for only one in four residential transactions in central London, because of the high prices brought about by foreign speculation. In other words, they're even worse off than New Yorkers.