Trotter Out of Columbus Circle

Charlie Trotter, the Chicago restaurateur who was supposed to bring his four-star dining to New York’s Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle, has agreed with the building’s retail developers to cancel those plans due to budgetary reasons and design disagreements.

The announcement came nearly two years after it was announced that he would become the final star in the constellation of top chefs at the Center’s “Restaurant Collection,” opening a seafood restaurant there.

Trotter told The New York Times that as his restaurant’s budget climbed from $6 million to $9 million to $11.5 million, the Related Cos., the center’s co-developer, decided to scale back the concept and design. The $11.5 million cost — for what would not have been a formal restaurant, although it was being designed by architect Michael Graves — would have been almost as much as that for Per Se, another restaurant in the mixed-use center where dinner with wine routinely costs $200 or more.

“I didn’t want to remove some of the exciting design elements to make it work,” Trotter told The Times. “And then the concept changed to something a little more casual than we originally planned.”

“There was a real disconnect between the cost and what this project should come in at,” said Kenneth Himmel, president and ceo of the retail-development division of the Related Cos. “We couldn’t get the project to where Charlie and I were both comfortable.”

Himmel also said he was looking for a replacement for Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s V Steakhouse on the building’s fourth floor. But Phil Suarez, Vongerichten’s partner, said no final decision had been reached on the steakhouse, which is jointly owned by the two men and Related Cos. “It may happen and it may not,” Suarez said.

Himmel said he would consider only New York chefs for future restaurants in the center. “I’m going to have a firm hand in the design and a firm hand in the selection,” he said.