The 3 Jalapenos Mexican restaurant closed for good in 2011 when Hurricane Irene brought floodwaters that submerged the one-story building. It was the second flood that caused extensive damage to the restaurant, which occupied a prominent space on Mamaroneck Avenue in the flood-prone village of Mamaroneck. The space has been vacant since.
A buyer has agreed to buy the property, according to real estate broker Nancy Wasserman of Coldwell Banker. Although she would not reveal the identity of the buyer until the transaction is closed, Wasserman confirmed that it plans to propose building a mixed-use development with retail stores on the ground floor and rental apartments above.
“People are already asking me, ”˜How tall is it going to be?”™ ”˜How much is it going to cost?”™ ”˜How many bedrooms are there going to be?”™” she said. The developer has been eyeing adjoining properties to potentially buy those as well.
What that proposal hinges on, though, is the anticipated rezoning of the area as part of an effort to spark transit-oriented development in the corridor around Mamaroneck”™s Metro-North train station. The village”™s board of trustees will hold a public hearing on the proposed revisions to the code Oct. 27, after a lengthy process that flagged the area as ripe for redevelopment and attractive to potential young renters who would be drawn in by the proximity to the station and to Mamaroneck”™s budding downtown scene.
Mamaroneck Avenue on the southeast side of the tracks has grown into a dining and nightlife destination with on-street parking and foot traffic, but the northwest side of the tracks remains a vehicle-dominated thoroughfare. The zoning is fragmented in the corridor, with some areas allowing commercial uses and other areas zoned only for residential (the former 3 Jalapenos”™ zone allows for residential development but not mixed-use). The train station itself was part of an adaptive reuse project that built a restaurant-bar in the old building.
Many of the existing retail stores there are noncomforming under the existing zone and most lots in the RM-3 residential zone are noncomforming due to their lot sizes, setbacks or building coverages. The rezone would not only allow for mixed use but also bump up allotments to bring more existing buildings into conformity and promote redevelopment. It would establish an overlay zone in the commercial zone.
“It”™s a major hodgepodge, and the reason this came up is to make that hodgepodge go away,” Wasserman, who lives nearby, said. She said she expected there to be ample interest in real estate in the corridor due to the rezoning. “The numbers will not work if the zoning is not changed,” she said.
The village and a local civic group called the Washingtonville Housing Alliance commissioned the transit-oriented development, or TOD, study after they were given a $38,500 grant in 2012 from the Tri-State Transportation Campaign and the One Region Funders”™ Group. The village later appointed a 15-member steering committee, worked with New York City-based BFJ Planning and held three public forums about the rezoning.
There will be no changes to density and height in the RM-3 zone but the overlay zone would allow for more density than other areas in the village. The overlay zone would also have a bonus for affordable housing: Developers can increase the floor area ratio from 0.6 to 0.8 when residential building meets a requirement of about 10 percent affordable housing out of a total development.
Mayor Norman Rosenblum, a Republican, said the TOD in Mamaroneck was not urban redevelopment and would not include any use of eminent domain. He also said the affordable housing provision was key to keeping intact the broad demographics of the village. “Not only will it bring retail and increase the tax base but it will bring more affordable housing,” he said. “I”™m big on keeping the diversity of the village of Mamaroneck.”
The rezone also comes with requirements for green building, flood mitigation measures and payment into a neighborhood stabilization fund for projects within the overlay zone. It also offers bonus allotments to ensure that a grocery store remains in the neighborhood ”“ there is an A&P on Mamaroneck Avenue near the Interstate 95 juncture.
Rosenblum said that the TOD, combined with an anticipated rezone of the village”™s industrial district, will spark new businesses and construction in Mamaroneck. “It all fits in to the continuing growth of the village of Mamaroneck so we stay No. 1, and I”™ll continue to be its cheerleader,” he said.
