Spenser Walsh reports in the Register-Star about an apartment complex being proposed for Route 66: "120-unit apartment complex proposed in Greenport."
The site for the proposed 120-unit apartment complex is the site of the former V&O Press building, next to the Sunoco gas station and the A&W, almost right across the street from the 116-unit apartment complex known as The Falls.
The report of the new proposal brings to mind that fifteen years ago, there was a different proposal for the site. Gossips reported about it here: "Get Your Kicks on Route 66." A developer named Harbalwant Singh wanted to create on the site what he called "Greenport Crossing," which he predicted would cause a "ripple effect," with the result that "Route 66 will be totally Route 9 in Poughkeepsie."
Greenport Crossing was to be built in two phases. The first phase would consist of an A&W restaurant, a twelve-pump gas station, and an "upscale" liquor store. The second phase was to consist of an 80-room Comfort Inn, with an indoor pool and fitness center, and a family entertainment center, with, among other attractions, "boutique" bowling lanes, laser tag, bumper cars, a carousel, a climbing wall, and "upscale" arcade games.
For his ambitious project, Singh sought a 100 percent tax abatement for twenty years from the Columbia County Industrial Development Agency (IDA). He didn't get it. In the end, only the first part of the project was built: the gas station, with the A&W and the liquor store.
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Across the street, with all its signs still intact, is the former beer store whose owner shot and killed his wife (mother?) several years ago. Who wouldn't want to see that sight multiple times a day?
ReplyDeleteYou probably wouldn't see it because the proposed residential units would be behind the gas station.
ReplyDeleteGreenport is currently seeing a lot of proposed new housing and that may have to do with the impending "threat" of a zoning plan.
In the same Planning Board meeting where the above was discussed was also a site plan application to build 50 units off Apple Meadow Rd. What is interesting about that proposal is that those wouldn't be rental units but condos.
All these proposals are under the massive caveat of Greenport's insufficient sewage and wastewater system. That has been a known problem for decades. I hope that yesterday's rain event that appeared to have made a few houses on Lincoln and Washington Blvd uninhabitable provides a spark to finally address this.
I was promised that it will be on the agenda of the town board meeting on Aug 5th.