View 34

Very poorly maintained building. Biggest waste of time are the elevators which as of April 2016 continue to break down every week and a new problem has erupted – brown unsafe water from the taps. Most tenants are dissatisfied and are planning to move out as soon as their lease is up. Prospective renters should be aware of many additional charges not included in basic rent which include WATER yes water and a $ 250 amenity fee per person even if you don’t use them. Rents are also increased by 5% every year despite the location and these various other charges. Door men are fine despite some reviews here. The rooftop finally reopened 3 years behind schedule (not even kidding) but residents now can’t use it for social events – you need to wear a wristband if you bring friends that too a max of 2? What is this? A hospital ward? They promise to fine you if you bring more people, I would like sue them for failing to provide clean water and basic elevators that work.

This place might seem nice with the rooftop and the all out amenities. However, be weary that the View 34 Management team is horrendous. To mention a few items where they seem to continuously fail:
1. Elevators constantly being out of service. Might not sound like a big deal. But Mon-​Fri when you’re trying to get to work you will find yourself standing in the hallway for 20 minutes just to get downstairs
2. Rooftop — Looks great now that it’s finally put up. BUT hold on — you’re not allowed to use it. Closes at 10 everyday. You’re only allowed 2 guests… wait for it… who need to be accompanied by you and wearing a wrist band. Also, no alcohol allowed. Violation of roof top rules will result in a $ 100 fine. So nice to look at, but you won’t be able to enjoy it.
3. Doormen — are terrible. Unless you are an attractive female or have a dog… you get dirty looks from them all the time. No hellos, good mornings, etc.
4. Management imposes annoying rules and charges throughout your stay.
Get that pen out!

I have been in this building since 2007 and its now 2016… so they must be doing something right!!! i really love this place its home for me and my family and it keeps getting nicer!!!
the doorman are like family, the leasing office is AMAZING and very welcoming!
if i could give 10 stars i would!
GREAT PLACE TO CALL HOME!!!

Lived here for years, but I had to leave. There’s graffiti in the stairway. There was a swastika there for months even though management was notified numerous times. Robberies began occurring when there were none before. Many apartments are rented out short term, so you never know who your neighbor is.
The elevators haven’t worked in ten years. Don’t let them try to convince you it’s temporary.
Many apartments are overstuffed with kids trying to save on rent. They throw parties and stumble around drunk in the halls. Often they throw bottles and cigarettes of the balconies.
The doormen who have been there a while are wonderful, that’s the only thing nice I can say.

I’ve been living here for years and what I, and others, witnessed in this morning’s lobby between a male tenant and a male employee from the leasing office is not what I would come to expect from any employee at this building or any employee or business professional in general. When a tenant with his dog asked why his key was not working at the buildings gym which he should have access to, the leasing officer asked to look at the tenants key and then — wait for it– refused to give it back! He claimed that the tenants key belonged to the building (since the tenants gf was currently borrowing the second set) and that he’d have to pay $ 100 to have it back! When the tenant said he’d pay the $ 100 which is little compared to all the rent he’s paid in the years he’s lived here, the leasing officer still refused to give it back!!! The tenant was calling his gf at work from the lobby to come and let him and the dog in who he had just taken out for a walk. We all felt so bad for this poor guy and of course there was really nothing any one of us could do. This is disgusting to witness and after all the rent we pay here not how I expect a fellow tenant to be treated. I live here and I know we get a set and another set lives at the concierge. This leasing employee needs to explain his rationale for taking a tenants key away in the way that he did (asking to see it and then not returning it) and apologize for his very unprofessional behavior and attitude. He is a poor representation of an employee, of this building and just a human being in general. Who does this here or anywhere? I don’t want this scene playing out in my lobby. Please look into this. Leasing employee is male, working on Thurs ³⁄₂₄ at around 9am. Didn’t catch his name, It took everything in me to not intervene.

View 34 has been a solid experience for us. The leasing agent we worked with (Josh) was excellent, right from the beginning. The building has awesome amenities, including a 24 hour full gym, doorman, game room, laundry service, kid’s playroom, conference rooms, dining room that you can rent out for parties, rooftop, etc. The view from our apartment is absolutely incredible with a view of most of midtown Manhattan. Whenever we had a request for repair, someone from maintenance came pretty quickly (within 24 hours). For people that are turned off by the fact that there is no subway nearby, you can take the M15 bus uptown/​downtown or M34 bus crosstown.
I knocked off a star for 1 reason. There are only 3 elevators per side (North/​South) and it always seem that 1 is broken. I’m usually not surprised if there is a line of 5 – 10 people waiting for the elevator. If I have to be somewhere at a certain time, I try to leave earlier just in case the elevators are packed. I’ll also mention that there is alot of construction in the area during the day. I’m never home during the day so it’s not a problem for me but something to consider for someone who is.
Overall, the pros outweigh the cons and we definitely enjoy living here!

I’ve lived a few different buildings in NYC and DC. By far and away this property is my favorite place I have lived. The residential and leasing staff are accommodating and helpful. The doorman are always pleasant. The views are breath taking. The building just renovated the roof and it looks awesome. The gym is fully loaded and no need to pay $ 250/​m to workout anywhere else. If I could give 10 stars I would.

I have been living at the view 34 for over a year now. Even though the construction is loud– the new amenities definitely make up for it! There is a beautiful rooftop with a tanning deck, BBQ, and movie area. There is a gym, game room, and laundry room. The management is very helpful. Brian is a joy to work with and has assisted me with all my requests. Definitely would recommend working with Brian and living at the view 34!

I have lived in View 34 for over 3 years. My 3 roommates and I have dealt with a lot of construction throughout the building but have always renewed because overall we have had no issues within our apartment and the construction is finally complete. The leasing office has always been accommodating with our renewal rate. Brian Leavy assisted us this year and was extremely efficient and understanding in our requests. He is always available for any questions or concerns and made the renewal process stress free.

For over a year now I have not had working elevators in this building, of the 4 elevators only 1 has been functioning at any given time. There is always a line of people waiting for elevators. It takes me somewhere from 10 – 20 minutes to leave the building in the morning because there is only one working elevator for 100s of tenants. UDR is the worst building management you could imagine. I don’t know how many times we have to ask these people but they keep lying and never fix it. They charge above average luxury building rents but DO NOT HAVE WORKING ELEVATORS.
Before you sign the lease, ask yourself this. Do you want to wait 10 – 20 minutes for an elevator?

I HATE this place. DO NOT LIVE HERE. I pay almost 4 grand a month for a one bedroom on the 20^th floor with views of the east river. However, the toilet is clogged basically once a week and remains broken for days at a time which is unacceptable. The water in the shower turns brown after 10 – 15 minutes of it being on which is disgusting and annoying. The elevators are ALWAYS broken and I swear to god it takes me at least 25 minutes just to get out of the lobby door from my apartment on the 20^th floor because only one elevator works at a time and it takes 15 minutes to show up, and then slowly stops at every floor on the way up and down EVERY TIME. Thank god I’m in shape because i’ve just chosen to take the stairs all 20 floors several times because i’ve been so fed up. Oh, not to mention I’ve lived here for 9 months and the rooftop has been «under construction» and off– limits for residents to go to the entire time i have lived here and they won’t tell us a date when it will be open for us to go up there. This place seriously sucks and is NOT worth the price i am paying to live here. I am trying to move out ASAP.

I am going to make this quick and easy, do not walk away from this building, RUN.
I have been living here almost a year and on a daily basis have to deal with the following:
— The building is always DIRTY. There is always garbage in elevators and mice run rampant in the corridors on the main floor by the service entrance.
— The service corridor smells like rotten garbage at all times.
— Cheap finishes everywhere (look at the pictures)
— Noisy building. It feels like a dorm. People that cannot afford the rent have units split with 4 roommates and more.
— Insane construction noise coming from the rooftop and building site across the street.
— More noise coming from the E 34^th Street Helipad. A lot of helicopters.
— Absolutely DECEIVING and DISGUSTING business ethics. Horrible management company (UDR).
— They blocked me from making online payment using my checking accounts so they can charge me a 5% late fee.
— $ 500 Extra for the gym membership but they will make it sound like it’s included in the rent when they take you on a tour.
— $ 100 Extra if you lose your gym key (it happened to me twice, didn’t lose it, but people that live here are so shady and they stole it from me at the gym).
— $ 50 Lockout fee from your apt
— $ 500 Pet Deposit
— About $ 45 extra every month for WATER. THEY CHARGE YOU FOR WATER! No one said anything about it when we signed the lease, which by the way we had to jump though hoops just to get a copy of it.
— I kept refusing to pay for the water for a few months, so they ended up charging me a 5% late fee on my whole rent amount ($ 3,145). Got them to waive it, but still.
— You will wait FOREVER for the elevators. When people return home from work (around 5 – 7) there is usually a line that extends to the mail room. Elevator cabins look run down. They are disgusting, poorly maintained, and usually are filled with party garbage on weekend mornings (Look at pictures)
— People will steal your laundry from the Laundry Room. Carts are also always missing.
— They WILL enter your apartment at random times WITHOUT permission.
— Paper thin walls. You hear EVERYTHING next door.
— Thin apartment doosr, you hear everything from the hallway. The doors are so light, it’s obviously cheap stuff.
— Forget about maintenance if you have a problem in your unit, you’re pretty much on your own. We’ve been trying to get them to fix the sliding door in our unit since the first week we moved-​in. (Look at the screenshot of all my inbox showing all the maintenance requests that I’ve submitted)
— Small but annoying, sometimes they call to let you know that you have a delivery coming up, most of the time they don’t. In most luxury building you always get a call to let you know.
— Cheap gym equipment and horrible stench. The windows are screwed shut so you can’t even get fresh air.
— Low ceilings heading to the gym, watch your head if you’re tall. While I was walking to the gym I scraped my hand on the ceilings dry wall finish putting on my sweatshirt.
— AGAIN, FILTHY building, especially on week-​ends, UDR takes shortcuts with everything. Cheap contractors, cheap equipment, cheap everything.
The only plus to this building– most of the doormen are Awesome.
If you’re smart enough, you will notice right away what kind of building this is. If you stop by at the leasing office, and don’t submit an application right away, wait to see how many times they will call you.
To sum up, for the money you will be spending here, you have much better alternatives. Seriously. Try a TFCornerstone building. They are always on top of their game (505W37 comes to my mind).

i have never lived at the View but after being bombarded by emails after I expressed interest, I simply wrote them and said, if I take a lease and there is more than an ordinary amount of construction noise (more than once a week), can my lease be broken without penalty
Needless to say, I never heard back from them again

I have lived in View 34 (formerly Rivergate) for 10 years. As a mother of 2 children all the amenities in the newly renovated building have made the days that are too cold or too hot to go outside much more enjoyable. The staff in the building from every level are the MOST helpful and friendly. They truly make this building a home. The conveniently located elementary school is state of the art and adds so much to this community. I can not say enough good things about the building.

The View 34 (formerly the Rivergate) is an amazing luxury building. I lived there for 2 years and it was a really pleasant experience. The rental staff is great, the doormen are awesome, and the facilities (laundry room, TV room, play room, party room, etc.) are really second to none. The lobby, hallways and apartments all had major renovations in the past 2 years– the building is beautiful and well maintained. I highly recommend it.

This apartment building is horrible! We had to move out because they were doing construction… while we were still living in the apartment! And… There was asbestos in the floors so we could not been be in the apt for 24 hours!!!
The elevators are always broken… The water gets shutoff mid week with no warning or will suddenly be brown!
We finally decided to move out and told them to halt the absurd construction for 1 day (a Saturday) and the workers showed up anyways!
Most unprofessional management company… Do not move in!!!
We read other reviews and ignored them… BIG mistake
Did I mention that the elevators are always broken?

JUST LISTEN TO ME (US APPARENTLY) DO NOT LIVE HERE.
I had MICE for the first time in my time in NYC in this apartment. Wasnt even on a low floor. When I mean mice, I mean 10+. I called them, they asked me if my trashcan was covered, then knocked on the door and handed me 10 sticky pads, so that I can live among a bunch of dead and dying mice.
The HELICOPTERS made it impossible to enjoy my «water» (more like freeway) views because they were loud. I mean loud loud.
The CONSTRUCTION made it impossible to live here because they renovate an apartment when people move so that they can charge more. The apartment below us started construction and the day it ended, our luck, they started above us. I got no sleep because they think saturday construction is appropriate.
The AMBULANCES from the hospital made it impossible to sleep, and I’m not a light sleeper but they’d sometimes get stuck in FDR traffic right across the street on their way to the hospital next to the building.
The doormen will only open the door for you if you’re a girl that they think are hot. Lived there for half a year, never didn’t open my own door. Didn’t mind it at all but thought it was obnoxious to have someone look at their cellphone as I walked by and then jump when they saw a girl.
AND THE KICKER.
We moved out and the day we were moving out (last day of the month) we woke up to construction crews entering our apartment, WHEN WE WERE STILL ASLEEP. They began removing our windows AS WE WERE IN BED. In mid-​feburary DURING THE POLAR VORTEX. We had movers coming so we asked them to hold off, since technically our lease didn’t end. Our movers arrived, they couldn’t move our stuff because construction was happening. When we asked to speak to the manager, she came down and said we will call the police if we get in the way. We told her that technically this is still our apartment until midnight, and that we needed to move out before they started construction around our stuff! She said she was calling the police. Our movers moved while the construction workers went to lunch.

The Rivergate calls itself a luxury apartment.
Their appearance in their new lobby where they have recently spent millions of dollars of aesthetic upgrades will try and fool you.
I have lived in this building and still do until my lease will expire.
There is constant dust from construction work in the building. I can never keep the apartment clean without dusting everyday.
There is always noise from construction.
The elevator breaks down on average 2 times a week and it takes sometimes 24 hours to get it back up and running. In the meantime they allow service and construction persons to use the resident elevators and often lock the elevators for the service men so at times you wait upwards of 10 minutes to even get on the elevator. This is pathetic in a building with 35 floors.
The staff have showed attitude and a recent serviceman who we came to do a repair verbally assaulted one of the female members of my apartment.
Water shut offs have happened every week for the past few months as well as temporary power outages.
They had the audacity to raise my rent price this year when they asked me to renew the lease. UDR are a corporation out to take your money and not to treat you with respect as one of the customers.
I do not recommend this building in its current state to anyone despite the potential this building would have under better management.
I agree with every other negative review on Unilocal.I do not need to write any more because you get the idea.
DO NOT LIVE HERE.
The doormen however are lovely.

DO NOT LIVE HERE. I would give this place a ZERO but like someone else, the doormen are awesome.
As everyone stated below, construction within the apartment and next door is crazy. Keep in mind that they are done with the school next door but there still is suppose to be a condo building which will take few years. WATER SHUT OFF’s on Saturdays from 8am-7pm…yes on a Saturday! If you do decide to rent here, good luck. Management is by far the worst I have dealt with. Imagine asking them a question and in Reply you get another question. Maintenance was terrible… imagine them coming to pay my ceiling and getting splatter on your cloth/​bed which was no where near where they painted. I really had a tough time sleeping… Management also will LIE to you and tell you things like:
«noise will stop in 2 months»: Its been 9 months and still going strong
«All windows will be replaced by July»: Its been 9 months and i had 3 months where constant dust would layer in my AC/​shoe rack
At the end, it is your choice and I just want to help anyone out so you dont go through the same stuff as majority of the people who live there. You should really go up the elevators and talk to those who live here before signing because that is where everyone discusses how much they hate this place.
I didn’t even list everything but just know after 1 year, they raised my rent 20% as well. Sadly, I wouldnt even have stayed here if they lowered my rent.
Oh I almost forgot, the District Sales Manager emailed me asking why I am giving my notice to move out… I sent a very professional email just stating the issues and raising the rent would not justify why we should resign. The response I got from him is the reason why I am writing this as I am not one to complain. Below is the response I got from an email starting with Thanks for your email and thanked him for his concern.
«You’re all set as I have you moving out’

Since I moved into the Rivergate about a year ago it has been a rather unpleasant experience. That would be because I am actually living in a construction zone.
Imagine constant water shut offs, jackhammering noises in the apartment next to you for 5 months at a time, elevators that make you wait 10 minutes (not an exageration), and then proceed to stop on every single floor because construction crews are constantly trying to finish jobs between floors.
Imagine a concrete lobby «under renovation» for nearly a year («nearly» because they started construction right after I moved in).
Then imagine that you get kicked out of your apartment (but are allowed to move within the building) because the building would like to… get this… renovate your apartment. Literally, this is a construction zone. I am getting kicked out of my apartment after 1 year so that they can continue construction. I am pretty sure that if you asked the management here, they would say «tenants are getting in the way of construction» rather than «the construction is getting in the way of the tenants.»
The positives are that the tenants here are all generally friendly because we can commiserate with each other about how awful the building is.
So, don’t move here unless:
1) you will not be in your apartment during the day construction hours
2) you enjoy taking the stairs
3) you plan to live here for only a year
4) you don’t mind having a non-​existant lobby
Keep in mind as well:
1) this is a flood zone
2) there are no subways nearby
3) this building neighbors the midtown tunnel traffic and the FDR