Microsoft outage delays vote on Amazon warehouse planned for Long Island's Sunrise Mall

Massapequa-area residents at a public hearing Thursday night largely opposed an Amazon warehouse and distribution center proposed for the Sunrise Mall site.

But a widespread Microsoft outage that disrupted Outlook email service Thursday prompted the Town of Oyster Bay Planning Advisory Board to postpone a vote on whether to recommend approval of the project's site plan to the Town Board.

Because some residents’ emailed comments about the project could not be received by town officials, the six members of the planning advisory board attending Thursday's hearing voted to take up the decision at the Dec. 10 meeting.

Amazon wants to build a 153,393-square-foot warehouse and delivery station on part of the 27.1 acres it plans to buy at the northern part of the mall property. The Seattle-based e-commerce giant also wants to construct a 4,950-square-foot fleet service center at the site.

The development would be a last-mile facility, where packages are sorted for the final stage of delivery to customers.

The facility would run 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The now-vacant mall would be demolished before construction of the Amazon facility begins.

About 50 residents attended the three-hour public hearing Thursday.

Most of the 18 people who spoke opposed the project, citing concerns about noise and air pollution from tractor trailers traveling to and from the facility, increased traffic congestion, declining property values and other issues.

"We have no reason to start to look like Queens," said Rachel Dinowitz, a Massapequa Park resident who was one of several opponents who drew applause after speaking.

Representatives for Amazon; law and engineering firms hired to work on the project; and Sunrise Mall Holdings LLC, the joint venture that bought the struggling mall in 2020, said that studies conducted for the proposed development found it would have little to no impact on traffic, noise and the environment. 

The public often has misconceptions about vehicle traffic generated by Amazon facilities because of their large size, Brad Griggs, Amazon’s director of economic development for the Northeast, said during the hearing.

"That’s why we do the community meetings to educate the residents, to educate the civic associations and community leaders on the exact type of operations this facility will have, and to explain that, for the vast majority of the day, there’s going to be very little activity from a traffic standpoint going on outside at this site," he said.

The project would be similar to, but smaller than, the Amazon facility in Syosset that opened in 2022, he said.

If the Massapequa project receives town approval, construction would take 13 months, and the facility would open by the 2028 holiday season, Amazon said.

About 100 warehouse workers, most of whom would work overnight, would be employed at the Massapequa site, Griggs said.

Tractor trailer deliveries to the facility would be concentrated between midnight and 5 a.m., according to Amazon documents submitted to the town. The company projects an average of about 30 truck deliveries per night.

In addition, electric vans — driven by third-party delivery operatorsto make last-mile deliveries — would depart the facility in waves, about 60 per group, every 20 to 30 minutes between 10 a.m. and 12:30 p.m., Griggs said.

The busiest hour for vehicle traffic would occur between 9 and 10 p.m., with 330 two-way trips, according to project documents submitted to the town. About one-third of those would be vans returning from deliveries and about two-thirds would be employee vehicles split evenly between arrivals and departures.

Sunrise Mall is in Oyster Bay’s light industrial district, but the property operates under a special-use permit granted by the town board in the 1970s.

Built in 1973, the 1.2 million-square-foot mall was once a bustling shopping destination but lost stores over the past decade amid the growth of online shopping. The COVID-19 pandemic, which forced temporary business shutdowns beginning in March 2020, added to the challenges facing shopping malls.

Sunrise Mall Holdings submitted plans for Amazon's Massapequa project to the Town of Oyster Bay in November 2025 under the name Project Alba.

Amazon is under contract to buy 27.1 acres of the 77-acre mall property for $75.9 million from Sunrise Mall Holdings, contingent upon approval from the town and other government agencies.