It’s official. New York’s City Council says the proposed Jean Novel tower next to MoMA can go ahead as long as it is approx. 225 feet shorter than the original plans. The New York Times‘s Robin Pogrebin explains:

Hines, the building’s developer, paid the museum $125 million for the property on West 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues, which is to include a hotel, residential apartments and additional exhibition space for the museum. People who live nearby have opposed the tower as too tall for the neighborhood.

Because the lower height will reduce the available space by 150,000 square feet, it remains unclear whether Mr. Nouvel’s design will be significantly revised and whether all the planned components will still fit in the building. […]  The building, which would have been as tall as the Empire State Building, will now be as tall as the Chrysler Building.

City Council Approves (Shorter) MoMA Tower (Arts Beat/NY Times)