A nine-story mixed-use building with 286 apartments is headed for 3565 3rd Avenue in Morrisania, on a site that until recently housed the Harriet Tubman Charter School. The proposal, filed between East 168th and East 169th streets, would replace a single-story brick school building that served the Bronx neighborhood for decades. It is one of the largest residential filings yet from a developer who has rapidly expanded his footprint across the borough over the past two years.
According to New York YIMBY, the development, also addressed as 1256 Washington Avenue, would rise 96 feet and total 174,645 square feet, with 160,177 square feet dedicated to residential use and 14,468 square feet set aside for community facility space. The building is expected to include a concrete structure, a cellar, a 30-foot rear yard, and 94 open parking spaces. Steven Westreich is listed as the owner behind the applications, operating through Westorchard Management, and Charles Mallea of Glass Architecture DPC is named as architect of record. The average unit size works out to roughly 560 square feet, suggesting the 286 residences are likely rentals, per the outlet's report. Residents would have access to the Freeman Street subway station, served by the 2 and 5 trains.
The site's prior civic role adds some texture to the filing. The property was long home to the Harriet Tubman Charter School under New York City Department of Education facility code X256, occupying a school structure built in 1966, according to NYC.gov. Before construction can move forward, Westorchard Management filed DOB full demolition applications in September through engineering representative Duy Hoang of Adroit Engineering PLLC to clear that single-story building, as detailed by Marketproof. No estimated completion date for the new building has been announced.
Commercial Space Hits the Market Ahead of Construction
Even with demolition still pending, the project's commercial footprint is already being marketed. Listings published this month show up to 25,398 square feet of lower-level and first-floor commercial and community facility space available for lease, with a projected availability date of October 1, 2027, according to LoopNet. The listing also offers lower-level space for lease.
A Developer With a Growing Bronx Portfolio
Westreich is the founder and president of Westbridge Realty Group, a New York City real estate investment and advisory firm established in 2015 that has bought, sold, or developed more than 300 properties, according to the company's own materials. Real estate analytics tracker PincusCo found that Westbridge filed 39 new building or major alteration permit applications totaling more than 1.7 million square feet in New York City over a 24-month period ending this year, with the firm's recent filings heavily concentrated in the Bronx.
Hoodline has tracked Westreich's expanding pipeline through much of the year, including a 12-story Kingsbridge proposal in March, a 297-unit multi-tower project in Soundview in August, and a 56-unit filing on Morris Avenue in Fordham Heights in September. That Soundview project is notable for how it was structured: Commercial Observer reported in August that Westbridge split the development into three separate 99-unit buildings, part of a citywide pattern where developers cap project sizes below 100 units to avoid mandatory $40-per-hour wage rules under New York State's 485-x tax abatement program, which replaced the expired 421-a abatement in April 2024. The 286-unit scope at 3565 3rd Avenue crosses that 100-unit threshold outright, raising open questions about how construction labor, affordability tiers, and tax abatement structuring will be handled on this particular project.
Growth and Affordability Pressures in Morrisania
The filing lands in a neighborhood that has already seen rapid change. U.S. Census Bureau data cited by the Bronx Times shows Morrisania's population surged 22% between 2010 and 2020, one of the highest growth rates of any Bronx neighborhood, driven in part by extensive public and private investment in affordable housing.
The 286-unit filing adds hundreds of small-footprint rental units to the local pipeline. Hoodline has also reported on other recent real estate activity along the Third Avenue corridor, including an 18-unit filing nearby and a $7.3 million building purchase by the Renaissance Youth Center, both signs that private developers and community groups alike are actively acquiring property in the immediate vicinity.
