W.P. Carey proposes subdividing North Amityville warehouse for multiple tenants; planning board questions parking and truck access

The Town of Babylon Planning Board heard an informational presentation on a proposal to renovate and partially demolish an existing 235,000-square-foot warehouse at 1000 New Horizons Boulevard in North Amityville for warehouse, office and distribution uses and to subdivide the building for as many as four tenants.

Keith Brown, counsel for the applicant, said the owner, W.P. Carey, has owned the building since 2000 and the intent is to reconfigure the site so it can accommodate one to four tenants. “Our position is that the 97 built-out parking stalls will adequately accommodate the parking demand at the site,” Brown said, while noting that additional land-bank stalls are shown on the plan and can be paved if a tenant requires more parking. Brown also flagged planning staff conditions 19 and 20 relating to land-bank parking, and the team said the application will go to the Town Board for permission to allow multiple tenants.

Ryan Hurd, vice president of project management for W.P. Carey, said the building historically supported a single manufacturing tenant and is now vacant. He explained the team plans new loading docks, speculatively prepared dock wells and the option to pave additional land-bank stalls when tenant demand requires it. “We’re doing a couple things here to give us some flexibility whether we get 1, 2, 3, or even 4 tenants in the building,” Hurd said.

Project engineer TJ Wilkinson outlined site upgrades including reconstruction of the ring road with heavy-duty asphalt to handle truck loads, a new 30-foot northern driveway to improve truck circulation, screening walls with plantings at the southern loading area, relocation of three on-site fire hydrants as needed for code compliance, drainage improvements including dry wells, and LED dark-sky–compliant lighting.

Traffic engineer Ethan Shikovsky summarized parking and traffic analysis. He said the Town’s parking code requires 368 stalls for the property’s use if evaluated by a certain standard, while the proposal provides 97 built stalls and up to 280 total including land-banked stalls. Based on Institute of Transportation Engineers (ITE) data, Shikovsky said a typical warehouse user would demand about 76 stalls, while an 80th-percentile higher-demand user would require about 229 stalls — both scenarios could be accommodated when land banked stalls are included.

Board members asked follow-up questions about truck turning movements, whether dock levelers and dock equipment would be provided (the applicant said 40,000-pound mechanical dock levelers would be installed where docks are provided), compactor and trailer-storage arrangements, sprinklering (engineer said the building is sprinklered), and whether interior spaces would be air-conditioned (the team said typical warehouse tenants expect heating and ventilation only; air conditioning would be tenant-driven).

Planning staff asked that the applicant show grading and drainage details for any future build-out of land-bank stalls. Counsel requested that the board approve the site plan; the board closed the informational hearing and reserved decision to allow staff review and to prepare a recommendation to the Town Board at a future work session.

The informational hearing was closed on a motion by Dan with a second by Frank; the board reserved its decision and left the record open for review and comment.