Rebuilding Riverhead 1 building at a time

The power of one.

Two years after a $500 million master plan for downtown Riverhead's redevelopment collapsed, entrepreneurs are transforming East Main Street one building at a time.

With little of the broad government vision and hefty price tag that often accompanies redevelopment projects, a new retail and restaurant row is slowly emerging from empty, locked storefronts in the East End's historic business center.

"Riverhead seems poised, geographically and structurally, as the place to have a new development hub," said Dennis McDermott, who in December announced plans to open a new eatery on East Main. "I see it as another Huntington."

What McDermott calls simply "the Riverhead Project" will convert a boarded-up 4,000-square-foot bank building at the intersection with Maple Avenue into a "hip and casual" restaurant with indoor and outdoor seating.

On the same block, Morgan Mechelsohn admired the airy space she turned into a consignment shop, The Red Collection. The former Ben Franklin store sat empty for at least five years before she took it over.

"It has good display windows and lots of space," Mechelsohn said. "We're pretty happy here."

For decades, most talk about Riverhead's downtown business district focused on which store would close next. Some longtime residents trace the decline back about 40 years to when the local A&P grocery store closed and shoppers started going elsewhere.

When the 800-seat Art Deco-style Suffolk Theater closed in 1987, moviegoers stopped coming downtown. And when Swezey's Department Store closed in 2003, shoppers looking for clothing, housewares and other supplies left.

In an effort to stop the losses, town leaders in 2005 proposed a plan to transform 12.5 acres along East Main Street with a new supermarket, hotel, 100 residential units and 30,000-square-foot multiuse building.

Four years later, the project fell victim to the town's refusal to condemn property and the collapse of the real estate and financial markets.

By then, the town had changed its zoning code to allow five-story buildings instead of the previous limit of three floors. The town also started allowing mixed-use and commercial development.

The zoning changes, along with $150,000 in state grants, enabled Dee Muma to gut and renovate an 82-year-old building at 1 East Main St. The $1.5 million project created five apartments in the upper two floors. At street level, her Dark Horse restaurant opened in September.

Muma said she fell in love with the old building and worked to maintain its character while she converted it.