SERVICE AREA · QUEENS
Façade restoration and Local Law 11 repairs for Queens co-op complexes and towers
Most Queens FISP buildings are brick: post-war co-op complexes along Queens Boulevard and in Flushing, and big developments like Rochdale Village and LeFrak City. Long Island City adds a newer generation of glass and panel towers. Queens had the lowest initial Unsafe rate of the four largest boroughs in the last cycle. What sets Queens apart is scale. Buildings here come in campuses, with many buildings to a board and many elevations to a building, so Banu plans the façade work across the whole complex as one program.
Co-ops the size of campuses
A single Queens co-op can own dozens of FISP buildings. Le Havre in Whitestone has about 32 in the FISP data, and Windsor Park in Bayside about 20. Rochdale Village in Jamaica has 20 buildings and nearly 6,000 apartments. Other complexes run as large: LeFrak City in Corona has 20 towers. Most of the borough's tall buildings stand on their own, set around courtyards and campuses, instead of lined up in a continuous street wall.
That changes how the work gets planned:
- One scope for every building, with conditions ranked worst first.
- One mobilization. Scaffold and crews move on to the next building without starting over, and we rig the drops under our own Special Rigger license.
- Progress shareholders can see. Where the schedule allows, we finish a building and take its protection down before moving to the next.
Queens by the numbers
- FISP buildings, Cycle 9
- 2,188
- Initial reports filed Unsafe
- 21.1%, lowest of the four largest boroughs
- Buildings reporting terra cotta
- about 1%
- Buildings reporting concrete
- 15%
- Buildings with an active shed permit (Oct 1, 2026)
- 780
Source: NYC Open Data, as of October 2, 2026. Method and full data →
What fails on Queens brick
There's almost no terra cotta here and little cast stone, so Queens façade work comes down to the basics, repeated across a lot of wall:
- Open mortar joints and cracked brick on long elevations (masonry)
- Rusting lintels over hundreds of identical windows
- Balcony slab edges and railing anchors on post-war towers (balconies)
- Parapets and coping (parapets)
- Window sealant and flashing
- In Long Island City, curtain wall gaskets, panel joints and sealants on towers built since 2001
Where the work is in Queens
- Forest Hills and Rego Park: The post-war co-op belt along Queens Boulevard and Yellowstone Boulevard, with about 74 FISP buildings on those two streets alone.
- Flushing and Whitestone: Large co-op complexes and, since 2000, a wave of new mid-rise and high-rise construction.
- Long Island City and Hunters Point: Rezoned in 2001. Western Queens (community districts 1 and 2) has added about 390 buildings of seven or more floors since 2000, and when they fail, it's usually at the glass, the panels and the sealant joints rather than the brick.
- Jamaica and Rochdale Village: One of the largest co-op complexes in the world.
- Corona and Elmhurst: LeFrak City and post-war towers off Queens Boulevard.
- Rockaway: Apartment buildings along Shore Front Parkway and Beach Channel Drive, out in the wind and salt air.
Jackson Heights: landmarked, mostly below the FISP threshold
The Jackson Heights Historic District is known for its garden apartments, most of them four to six stories, so few are in FISP. Exterior work there still needs an LPC permit, and any parapet facing the street still needs its annual observation. Landmark restoration →
Queens questions
Our co-op has a dozen buildings. Do we file one FISP report or twelve?
One per building. FISP is filed building by building, so a complex usually has several filings, often on the same sub-cycle when the buildings share a tax block. That works in your favor. One contractor can run every building on a single schedule and a single mobilization, and take the worst conditions first.
Our Jackson Heights building is in the historic district but only five stories. Does FISP apply?
No. FISP applies to buildings greater than six stories, and most Jackson Heights garden apartments are four to six. Two other rules still reach you, though: a parapet facing the street needs an annual observation under Local Law 126, and any exterior work in the district needs an LPC permit before it starts.
Queens had the lowest initial Unsafe rate in Cycle 9. Can we relax?
Not on the strength of a borough average. The lower rate mostly reflects the stock: brick buildings without the terra cotta and cornices that fail on older Manhattan and Bronx buildings. Your own report is what counts, and the SWARMP items on it still have to be repaired before your next inspection, or they get refiled as Unsafe.
Is a courtyard building more work?
Usually, yes. Courtyard and campus buildings have more elevations and more corners per apartment than a building on a street wall. The upside is access, because setbacks and courtyards often mean less street work and fewer neighbor agreements.
Let's talk about your building
Tell us about your Queens complex
Send us the number of buildings, your sub-cycle and what the last reports said. We'll lay out the work across the whole complex.
