Downtown plan faces last major hurdle

A five-year effort by Farmingdale officials and residents to turn around a downtown pocked with vacant storefronts and dowdy architecture faces its last major hurdle Monday.

At stake is a plan that would allow mixed-use residential and retail redevelopment projects to go forward in the downtown business district. The changes would bring higher density and extended hours of activity downtown along with increased control over design of structures and signage.

The village has scheduled a hearing at 7 Monday night at the library on a draft of an environmental-impact statement, which must be approved before a new zoning code and revised master plan can be adopted.

The revitalization project for 60 acres of the downtown area began in 2006 with a "visioning process" conducted by the planning group Vision Long Island. Next came proposed revisions to the village master plan that dates to the late 1980s and the zoning code for downtown.

Mayor George Starkie said the village initially was considering an approach "the way a lot of towns and villages do it" -- with special-use permits and overlay districts that would allow developers to build higher-density, mixed-use projects not allowed by the existing zoning.

But officials instead decided to take a more comprehensive approach by updating the master plan and rewriting the zoning code. Rather than approving development projects piecemeal, Starkie said, "we wanted to look at every property that was subject to change in the downtown area and do a cumulative impact study on what that would do to the village."

Eric Zamft, the village's planning consultant, said the existing zoning has "a lot of gaps and a lot of outdated items," such as regulations governing blacksmith's shops and parking requirements. The updated code will differentiate between what can be built downtown and elsewhere. And it will allow apartments above stores, which once were permitted but now are illegal.

Starkie said there is no organized opposition but a few people have voiced concern over density and traffic. "One of the things we hear repeatedly is that 'We're going to end up like Queens,' " he said. "But we're creating more green space in this process."

After tonight's hearing, the village will accept comments until July 22 and then must respond to them in a revised, final impact statement. Yet another hearing on that version may be necessary before the village board can vote on acceptance of it. Public hearings would be required on the updated master plan and new zoning code before the board could vote on whether to adopt them.