Rybak Files Plans For 527-Unit Coney Island Project

Rybak Development is gearing up for a massive development on its home turf.

The Coney Island-based developer filed plans with the Department of Buildings on Tuesday to build a 527-unit mixed-use development in the historic Brooklyn neighborhood it calls home. The project, dubbed Tilyou Towers, will redevelop a city-owned parking lot at 2108 Surf Avenue into a 28-story, 850,000-square-foot apartment building with ground-floor retail.

Plans for the project buck the trend of developers capping their residential projects at 99 units to avoid the wage floor set by the 485x tax incentive. The abatement requires developers to pay a construction wage of at least $40 per hour to qualify for a property tax exemption on buildings with 100 or more units, inadvertently incentivizing developers to build smaller buildings to avoid the wage requirement.

“I was excited to finally be asked to design a larger building rather than chop it up into a bunch of smaller buildings,” said Eugene Mekhtiyev of IMC Architecture, who designed the building.

CEO Sergey Rybak said the 485x wage floor required the developer to shift its strategy. But where other developers scaled down, Rybak said that his firm instead embraced the larger footprint, which allowed them to take advantage of economies of scale.

“Larger-scale projects tend to make more sense because you can make better buys,” he said. “If I’m buying 500 [air conditioning units], it’ll be much less expensive than somebody buying 100. Unit volumes really allow us to work with vendors and get the best possible pricing, thus being able to pay the higher wage requirements.”

The units will be much larger than the typical New York City apartment, averaging 950 square feet compared to the approximately 733-square-foot average among Manhattan units.

The project is also slated to deliver 108 parking spaces for residents and an additional 310 public parking spaces available for rent on a daily or hourly basis.

The developer is slated to begin construction on the 11-story podium and two 28-story towers in the second quarter of 2027. Construction is expected to take 30 months.

The Economic Development Corporation selected Rybak in October 2025 after releasing a request for proposals to build the 500-unit project on 80,000 square feet of city-owned public parking.

The development, named after Steeplechase Park founder George Tilyou, is part of the city’s effort to develop Coney Island after the 2009 rezoning of the area. Mayor Zohran Mamdani doubled down on the push to revitalize the South Brooklyn neighborhood earlier this year, committing $1 million to a new Business Improvement District.

The building is the latest Coney Island development for Rybak after the firm sealed a mixed-use project known as Sky Three at nearby 532 Neptune Avenue in partnership with Rubie Schron’s Cammeby’s International Group. The project, comprising three 20-story towers, is currently leasing 499 units and 60,000 square feet of retail. The development joins other new buildings in Coney Island, such as the 463-unit rental project at 1515 Surf Avenue.