Every bedroom of a rental is required to have a window in New York.
But in this part of town, the advertising rights alone probably vastly exceed any possible revenue from renting the building for residential use. It’s kind of like the tiny building in Times Square that has the ball on top. I don’t think people even realize there’s a building behind all of the billboards, but it was original New York Times building.
The ground floor is a Sunglass Hut from the looks of things. Then the first floor looks like it might be offices, or a fancy apartment. The other floors could be storage space for the tenants and the landlord.
My first instinct was perhaps they raised the ceiling in the first floor to occupy some of the second. But thinking on it more, high ceilings without windows to go with them usually don't make the space feel that much bigger. You can spend up to a couple feet on crown molding but beyond that you're well into diminishing returns.
One Times Square is no longer fully empty (besides ground floor retail) you’re right that it is now just almost entirely empty as they’ve added an observation deck and a small visitors center/museum about the building as of January this year.
Some other buildings in Times Square keep several floors empty to use for signage instead, a minimum of which is actually mandated by the city.
A lot of the buildings along Canal Street in New Orleans, with souvenir and liquor stores on the ground floor, are empty upstairs as well.
I can think of buildings in other cities in seemingly premium real estate, including the Chicago Loop, that are notably underutilized.
Old, cramped upstairs spaces in crowded, touristy commercial districts just aren’t that useful. A small business would rather just get an office in WeWork.
Converting to housing is going to be expensive and probably also not worth it. Tourist lodging might work, but the licensing can also be an issue and tourists can be weird — no matter how much you tell people a place like that is noisy and on one of the busiest corners in the world, you’ll get reviews complaining about the noise and chaos.
I was thinking the same question. It certainly looks unoccupied -I can’t imagine people living in the other side but then again it _could_ be very well maintained and decorated on the inside despite the eyesore looks on the outside. Moreover since the lower floors are commercial it must mean that at least the upper floors are keeping out the elements.
I know. I was expecting something easier on the eye. Maybe a century of being behind billboards has wrecked it. The 1906/1907 photographs look much better.