River Edge Associates LLC, with an address in Port Chester, has submitted plans to construct an 81-unit rental apartment building at the Tarrytown waterfront. The proposed plans are “Phase 5” of the larger Hudson Harbor development that has been underway for many years. The newly proposed building would be known as The Gatehouse.
In February 2006, Tarrytown’s Board of Trustees and Planning Board approved the initial Hudson Harbor project for 238 residential units, 65,000 square feet of commercial space,15,000 square feet of retail space, a 22,500-square-feet recreation center, an addition to the Tarrytown Senior Center, and public open space along the water, including a park and promenade.
Tarrytown’s Building Department now has advised the developer of The Gatehouse that the addition of 81 residential units in the new building poses a problem. The developer was told that because the entire Hudson Harbor development was only supposed to have 238 residential units, and to date 218 residential units have been constructed at the larger development, the addition of 81 units would bring the unit count to 61 more than the number for which environmental approvals were granted. The developer was told that because the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) review covered a project with only 238 units it does not have SEQRA-approved rights for what’s proposed in The Gatehouse.
Attorneys Kory Salomone and Vincent M. Pedone of the White Plains-based law firm Zarin & Steinmetz point out that the original SEQRA approvals have been modified over the years to adjust for various changes in the project with the most recent SEQRA adjustments made in 2010. Originally 20 townhouses were to be constructed on the parcel where The Gatehouse is being proposed.
The Gatehouse would be four-stories and would have a unit mix of 10 studios, 31 one-bedroom apartments, and 40 two-bedroom apartments. There would be approximately 1,500 square feet of rooftop amenity space. The project would include 157 parking spaces.
DTS Provident Design Engineering, LLP completed a traffic and parking study for the proposed “Phase 5” project. It found that given the project’s proximity to the Metro-North commuter rail station, it would require a total 92 parking spaces on a typical weekday and the 157 parking spaces proposed would be more than adequate.
DTS found that although the proposed project has a higher number of total units than the previously approved 20 townhome units, the townhome units require more parking per unit as the overwhelming majority of townhome units being constructed today are three or more bedrooms, which translates to more vehicles per unit. The site at Hudson View Way and Division Street is approximately 2.12 acres and currently is improved with an unused parking lot.
A separate study by DTS on the number of school children expected to be living at The Gatehouse concluded that it would attract only three or four new children to be enrolled in the Tarrytown public schools. The study found that the 20 townhomes that had been planned for the site would have resulted in five additional children to be educated in Tarrytown’s schools.
