What Is Rising on the Block
Demolition is under way at 350 Park Avenue in Midtown East. New York YIMBY and Our Town both report a 64-story tower of 1,414 feet. Rudin's project page describes a 62-story building.
Three developers carry the project. Vornado Realty Trust, Rudin and Ken Griffin are named in the YIMBY report. Foster + Partners is the design architect.
Citadel and Citadel Securities, Griffin's companies, hold the anchor leases. Those leases cover at least 850,000 square feet. That is nearly half the office space in the building.
The tower yields 1.8 million square feet of Class A office space. YIMBY puts capacity at 6,000 employees. The site covers 53,000 square feet between East 51st and East 52nd Streets.
Why the Anchor Lease Sets the Group Calendar
Group sales teams track anchor tenants. One tenant at 850,000 square feet delivers more corporate demand than a set of smaller leases.
Six thousand workers arrive at one address. Planners should expect board meetings, client visits, training days and departmental offsites to cluster in the same midweek window.
The tower supplies the demand base. Neighbourhood hotels supply the sleeping rooms and the meeting rooms. The delivery date governs every RFP.
The Delivery Date and the RFP Date
Our Town reports site signage names Waldorf Demolition as general contractor and puts demolition completion around March 2027. The full project is projected for completion in 2032.
Treat 2032 as a target. The joint venture controls the actual schedule.
Four phases carry the group pipeline.
The demolition phase runs through roughly March 2027. Citadel holds a 504,000-square-foot lease at Brookfield Properties' 660 Fifth Avenue, reported by Commercial Observer in January 2025. That workforce sits outside the 350 Park Avenue block until the new tower opens.
The construction phase runs 2027 to 2032. The project team, consultants and trades work a multi-year calendar. No source publishes the workforce count. Planners should ask the general contractor for the workforce projection and the site's lodging arrangements.
The pre-opening phase runs from roughly 2031 into 2032. Occupancy dates begin to firm up. Planners should lock meeting space and room blocks for the first operating quarters in this window.
The operating phase starts in 2032. Six thousand workers arrive. That is the demand base the current RFP prices.
What Midtown East Charges Now
PwC published the Manhattan Lodging Index for January to June 2026. Manhattan RevPAR rose 4.5 percent on a 6.3 percent increase in ADR. Occupancy fell 1.7 percent to an average of 80.7 percent.
Midtown East held the top position in 2025. PwC reports the neighbourhood among the weakest in 2026 so far. Occupancy fell 3.6 percent in the first half.
Midtown South led the borough at 7.1 percent RevPAR growth. Midtown West recorded the smallest gain at 3.9 percent.
Midtown East occupancy is soft today. Rate carries the district's growth. Planners holding 2027 to 2029 dates can press on rate.
Meeting Inventory Is Small Format
An anchor tenant of 6,000 workers needs rooms that seat 20 to 150 people.
The San Carlos Hotel lists a 425-square-foot meeting room that seats 14 guests. Its Garden Terrace Penthouse measures nearly 1,500 square feet and seats 30 on the terrace.
Rooms at that scale cover executive meetings and small conferences. A 6,000-person anchor exceeds the format. Planners should pair hotel room blocks with off-site venues and place those venue holds before the occupancy date is announced.
Supply Additions Are Thin
Four hotels opened in Manhattan in the first half of 2026. They added 1,328 rooms. IHG opened three of the four, per PwC.
The Midtown East addition is the Kimpton Ashbel at 70 Park Avenue. IHG opened it on April 30, 2026 with 205 guestrooms in a reimagined Beaux-Arts building. The building dates to 1928 and previously traded as the Doral Park Avenue Hotel.
PwC reports hotel supply is growing below demand. PwC flags stricter zoning rules as a delay and cancellation risk for the pipeline.
Midtown East gained 205 rooms against a 6,000-worker demand base due in 2032. Ask for multi-year rate protection on repeat dates.
The RFP Sequence
For 2027 to 2029 dates, issue the RFP now. Ask for rate caps across multiple years and a right of first refusal on the same dates next cycle.
For 2032 and later dates, hold off on a committed rate. Send a letter of intent and request a first-refusal window instead. Rebid once the developer publishes an occupancy date.
Every RFP should request four figures. Ask for the tower's occupancy date, the room block the anchor tenant has committed, the meeting-space square footage the hotel can guarantee and the coach loading plan for East 51st and East 52nd Streets.
None of those four figures appears in the published record.
Planners should sign multi-year terms before the anchor tenant's occupancy date.