CHANGED:Summit Greenfield + town traffic consultant will appear in joint Town Bd-Planning Bd meeting
Three meetings in one on Chappaqua Crossing
6:00 p.m. Tuesday, May 13, 2014
UPDATE Saturday, May 17: THE MEETING TIME HAS BEEN CHANGED: The Tuesday, May 20 work session will now begin at 8:30 p.m. [The public hearing on Homeland’s cell tower proposal for Armonk Road will take place, as originally scheduled, at 7:00 p.m. and run until 8:30 p.m.]
The Town Board’s agenda states: “8:30 pm – 10: 30 pm Referral to Planning Board/Westchester County / Planning Joint meeting” and the Planning Board’s agenda states: “8:30 P.M. JOINT WORK SESSION WITH TOWN BOARD / Chappaqua Crossing Amended PDCP.”
UPDATE Monday, May 19: On Tuesday, May 20, at 8:30 p.m. at Town Hall Summit Greenfield will make a presentation of its latest proposal, the Town and Planning Boards will discuss the new site plan, the TB will officially refer the plan to the Planning Board, and traffic consultant for the town, Michael Galante, will talk traffic. Need to catch up? This article originally published in Nov. 2012 is still a good summary of the issues and the thinking at the time: A primer on the proposal for grocery and retail at Chappaqua Crossing, NCNOW.org, with notes updating it.
Published Tuesday, May 13, 2014 [Editor’s note: Meeting time is now changed to 8:30 p.m.]
Editor’s Note: In response to an email from NCNOW asking for confirmation that—as Supervisor Rob Greenstein stated in last night’s TB meeting—next Tuesday, May 20, 2014, the Town Board will hold three meetings it has sought to combine before, Town Administrator Jill Shapiro returned the following email: “A joint Town Board/Planning Board meeting will be held from 7:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. in the Assembly Room of Town Hall, televised [and streamed live]. We expect the Applicant [Summit Greenfield] to present its proposed revised PDCP [Preliminary Development Concept Plan], to have that plan referred [officially to the Planning Board and the County Planning Department for comment] and to have a presentation by Michael Galante [the town’s F.P. Clark consulting traffic engineer] on traffic.
Shapiro did not respond to the question of how the Planning Board’s scheduled public hearing on the Homeland cell tower proposed for Armonk Road will be affected by this joint meeting on the same night—Tuesday, May 20.
[UPDATE Mon. May 13: 10:00 p.m.: Shapiro states that the public hearing for Homeland will take place at 9:30 p.m., following the Chappaqua Crossing meeting.]
Galante has twice canceled appearances—one before the previous Town Board in fall of 2013, and one scheduled for April 22—to respond to questions on traffic associated with the grocery-retail proposal. Summit Greenfield will present its latest revised plan for the proposal. See In new site plan SG asks that limit on number of 1,500 to 5,000 s.f. stores be removed, NCNOW.org, 4/12/14.
For archived articles on Chappaqua Crossing, click HERE, or use NCNOW’s “Search” box, using quotation marks for multiple words. For example, “Chappaqua Crossing” in the search box will bring up 35 pages of related articles, newest to oldest.
It seems to me that the “traffic expert” would need to know how many big box stores and other stores will be allowed into this Whole Foods strip mall before he/she can calculate the # of trucks and subsequent damage to our roadways.
Will the developer be paying to put shoulders on the roads leading up to this new Northern Westchester shopping destination? If one of those 18 wheelers blows out a tire from one of the many ditches and potholes, the roads could be tied up for hours!
Nice photograph of the cupola. But you should have used the photo from Team New Castle’s facebook page during the election where Greenstein cut and pasted the cupola and put it on top of Staples. Who’s the joke on now?
According to the Town Website, at this meeting “the Town Board expects to refer the revised plan to the Planning Board and Westchester County Planning Department for their comment and review.”
Can anyone explain what the implications are when the Town Board refers the revised plan to the County Planning Department? What is their role and is their approval necessary? Have any of the earlier SG proposals been referred to them?
Editor’s Note: The county has commented on all previous iterations of the proposal. The Town Board is obliged to submit applications to them for comments (just as the TB is obliged to submit applications to the local Planning Board).
X amount of square feet equals x amount of cars. X amount of stores yet to be defined equals x amount of trucks needed to bring in supplies and inventory. Whole Foods needs to generate x amount of dollars per day, per week, per month. A tractor trailer can only bring in so much of a value of goods. So what is the average value of inventory being carried on a truck, and how many of a ‘controlled’ size truck’ needs to come to CC in order to provide the profit needed. If we have 40 foot trucks, the frequency will be less, if we restrict the trucks to a smaller size, the frequency of deiveries will be more. So, we actually want the very biggest trucks coming to CC – not small trucks. Otherwise they will be flying around the site like bees. I guess this is a done deal.
Dear No NO NO:
Restricting deliveries to nighttime hours seems like it could address the concern you express. I fail to see how smaller trucks at a loading dock presents any issue at all.
Dear crunching # of trucks:
The now closed Grand Union distribution center off of 117 in Mt Kisco
was a source of truck traffic through the CC area while it was opened. Can anyone recall huge problems with that level of 18 wheel traffic. I can’t during the 7 years that my children attended Greeley driving to school every day.
CC is not a SNAFU. The only real objection, that is a genuine one, is the level of traffic and use which exceeds the Reader’s Digest historical peak use. If deliveries can be restricted to times outside that peak use time, what’s the problem? (other than you simply don’t want it, period, as per NO NO NO)
Thanks No No, good point about the bizzy bee swarm of trucks. But your guess about its a done deal is premature and pure but subtle propaganda.
X trucks, X cars, X stores make the intensity on the site but I would like you to include the car as the other delivery vehicle; attracted to 10 or 20 or even 30 other stores’ delivered products, baubles and trinkets from what part of the world who knows. The image of a car “cloud of gnats” comes to mind; more stores = more offerings to a broader demographic = more cars delivering the stuff back to their garages everywhere in range of a twenty minute drive.
Anyway, more stores equals more of everything. Whole foods is clouding our vision and like a ripe fruit it’s attracting that cloud of gnats.
The swarm of stores is needed at CC …..no matter how much NIMBY sand or smoke screen is employed to cloud the issue. The real problem, which is now a moot point, is the 111 families that will be li ing on that site.
Stores are a smoke screen . 111 units are it
WHAT ABOUT THE SCHOOL BUDGET VOTE……MAY 20 7AM – 9PM ?
IT IS WRONG TO CUT INTO THIS VITAL ELECTION
All I know is that when I see the words “high-end” attached to an establishment, as it appears to be with Whole Foods (and presumably the gym that may also go onto the property), I run, not walk, in the opposite direction, as high-end anything is not in my budget. So mine is one less car you all have to worry about.
We are a high end town which is deserving of everything high end. If you think that you are not within that characterization, then, maybe, just maybe, the town and with its new, upscale lifestyle enhancement at CC isn’t for you. Betterment is a good thing in my book.
The Seven Bridges school is a white elephant and a budget buster money sponge. It was the death knell for downtown. CC pulls us up out of that expensive hole that prevents you from getting that second car.
As Mr. Laster pointed out, Tuesday May 20th from 7:00am to 9:00pm is the school’s budget vote. We are appreciative of the change, for whatever reason, of the meeting time. Now, there is no good reason to not come to Horace Greeley and vote.
If you all think that the “high end” Whole Foods will guarantee you “high end” stores to complete the strip mall planned for the Reader’s Digest property, I’d love to know what people in this town are smoking, because you must be high!
The vacancies will force other stores and businesses into the newest suburban eyesore.
There has to be a better use for this beautiful property.
Such a shame shopping takes precident.
@ high end,
Sounds like you’ve been smoking the NIMBY grass!
Dear High end (as per ‘don’t inhale’), what vacancies are you talking about? The immaterial downtown shake out of marginal stores? or the projected (ie dreamed of) CC store vacancies.
The CC vacancies are irrelevant. SG will pay the increased real estate taxes due the town once the project gets the go ahead, without regard to ultimate success. If a super success, the taxes will increase. If vacancies:
a) less traffic per NIMBY obstructionist rhetoric
b) tax reductions end, at a minimum
The sand you are trying to throw in the eyes of progress and reason, at this point in time, is no longer able to block the view of those of us who are rational, reasonable and have common sense ( both practical and financial).