Big parking garage not needed?
Apollo shrinks, so does parking
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A 1,200-space above-ground garage behind the Woolworth site?
Forget about it.
Consultants working on the update of Riverhead Town's East Main Street Urban Renewal Area said last Wednesday that with Apollo Real Estate Advisors' plans for downtown Main Street having been drastically shrunk, the need exists for only about 450 to 500 new parking spaces downtown.
As a result, the proposed 1,200 space garage, which carried an estimated price tag of about $25 million in 2006, and for which it had yet to be determined who pays that cost, is not needed.
Attorney Steve Latham, who is working for the town on the renewal update, said the town could provide the 450 to 500 new spaces either by building a smaller parking garage or by adding new surface parking. Town officials recently suggested buying property on the south side of Second Street and the west side of East Avenue to expand the parking lot behind the Woolworth site.
The renewal plan's draft generic impact statement says there are 500 more parking spaces than needed in downtown now, assuming its current condition, which includes many vacant buildings. The parking study also initially based its parking estimate on Apollo's much larger original plan, which called for a hotel, a multiplex, a specialty food store and other uses, and determined that 1,400 spaces were needed, according to traffic engineer Vinnie Corrado of Dunn Engineering.
"We did a re-analyses," Mr. Corrado said. The new number puts the parking shortfall at about 450 to 500 spaces, he said.
That figure includes the estimated parking demand created by several downtown proposals, including Apollo, the proposed Atlantis Marine World hotel and the proposed hotel at the former Ben Franklin site, and is based on the assumption that all the vacancies are filled, Mr. Corrado said.
"We actually studied a full buildout of downtown, which is the farthest thing from reality," Supervisor Phil Cardinale said. "Apollo has spent $700,000 on this study and we can't even find people to rent out the space. You've got to understand this in context, and then try to keep a straight face."
Apollo has told town officials that it has yet to sign any tenants for its slimmed-down project because prospective tenants have been scared away by all the vacancies. And landlords of other buildings have said they can't rent any space downtown because prospective tenants fear the possibility of their building being acquired by Apollo.
The revised parking estimate also only takes into consideration Apollo's plans for the north side of Main Street, where the developer owns property.
"We are in agreement with the town and its consultants that the need for additional parking varies based on the size of our building on the north side and the size and number of other proposed projects in the downtown area," said Kevin Davis, a partner in Apollo. "Our project on the north side works with or without the larger garage. We do not oppose the shrinking of the parking garage."
On the south side, Apollo recently showed plans for a five-story, 125,700-square-foot building east of East End Arts Council that would have retail and restaurants on the ground level and 68 condo units on the upper floors. It also includes a five-story, 170,400-square-foot building west of East End Arts Council and retail and restaurants on the ground floor and 90 condo units above it.
Apollo still doesn't own any of that land, however. Those portions of Apollo's plans are considered to be "phase two and three" by Apollo, which is concentrating on the Woolworth site first, although it also says the residential development is where the profit would be.
The urban renewal plan's environmental study recommends major road improvements to accommodate those plans, such as widening the Flanders Road traffic circle and realigning Peconic Avenue to meet Roanoke Avenue.
"Some of these projects, I can tell you right now, they're not going to happen" Mr. Cardinale said. The total square footage of all the downtown projects studied in the urban renewal plan would be the equivalent of two Tanger Outlet Centers, he said.
"Do we really think two Tangers are coming downtown?" he said.
Two other recommendations being discussed. One would require that larger residential complexes supply their own on-site parking, which would reduce the number of spaces the town needs to provide. The other is a new "impact fee" that would charge developers a certain fee based on how much additional square footage they add to the urban renewal plan's boundaries, according to Mr. Cardinale.
The town's zoning downtown allows up to 500 residential units on the upper floors of buildings that may be as tall as five stories. The 500 units are restricted to the Downtown Center-1 (DC-1) zone, which stretches from just west of Griffing Avenue to just east of Ostrander Avenue.
The East Main Street Urban Renewal Area runs from Peconic Avenue to just east of Ostrander Avenue.
Another topic discussed was a town Planning Board recommendation to shrink the area downtown covered by the DC-1 district, which permits the 500 residential units. The Planning Board proposed ending it at McDermott Avenue and East Avenue on the east, and Griffing Avenue on the west.
What would happen if the Town Board did that?
"We would have to go back and redo the entire study," said consultant Jim McAllister of AKRF, the firm that did the renewal plan update.
The update will eliminate the need for projects covered by it to conduct separate environmental impact studies of their own, officials say, although none of those projects can be approved until the update is approved. So far, only Atlantis has submitted a formal application.
Mr. Cardinale said the town had hoped to adopt the plan update by Aug. 19, but that date has now been pushed back to Sept. 16 due to constraints associated with required notification periods for hearings.
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