Prior to the coronavirus outbreak that has upended the daily lives of millions of New Yorkers, a $1 billion development and rezoning plan along the Flushing Creek waterfront was one of the most talked-about stories in Queens.

For F&T Group, one of the three developers, the waterfront is the next step in the “evolution” of Downtown Flushing, F&T’s Chief Investment Officer Richard Siu told the Eagle in a sit-down interview.

“The waterfront does not look like anywhere else in Downtown Flushing,” Siu said, noting that it is the last area of Downtown Flushing that hasn’t yet been built out.

F&T and the other two members of FWRA, United Construction & Development Group and the Young Nian Group, would create a 13-tower, mixed-use complex of housing, hotels, offices and shops across the 29 acres of mostly unutilized land. Most of the land can be built “as-of-right,” meaning that the developers do not need a land use variance or rezoning to build the bulk of the project. The rezoning encompasses a section of the land that developers say is needed to make the project flow together better.

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