Ask White Plains Mayor Tom Roach what he thinks of the city he”™s led since February 2011 and you”™ll hear superlatives about where it is today, a strong vision for the city”™s future and some very strong convictions about what needs fixing.
A prime item on Roach”™s mind these days is the legacy of urban renewal from the 1970s and ”™80s.
“At the time the concept was ”˜big roads, get them in and get them out, get them back to wherever they want to live”™ because no one”™s going to want to live in cities anymore,” Roach told the Business Journal during an interview in his City Hall conference room that was attended by the city”™s Planning Commissioner Christopher Gomez.
Roach said although the Galleria shopping mall and office buildings that were developed in White Plains during urban renewal did help turn around a decaying city and were right for the time, times have changed.
“We have a chance to rectify the conditions that were created during urban renewal,” Roach said. “We have a chance to restore an organic feel, a genuinely walkable city, a place where people want to take their time.”
Roach was elected to the White Plains Common Council in 2001. He was serving as council president in 2011 when Mayor Adam Bradley resigned. Roach became interim mayor and was elected to fill the balance of Bradley”™s term. He won a full four-year term in 2013 and was re-elected in 2017.
Roach is an advocate of improving the experience in downtown by making it easier and safer for pedestrians to get around, welcoming the use of bicycles and encouraging the availability of more products and services at street level.
”˜NO COFFEE SHOP”™
“When I had an office at 81 Main St., when I wanted a cup of coffee, I had to wait for the Galleria to open. All those office buildings and no coffee shop at street level. It just wasn”™t the thinking at the time,” he said while recalling his former career as an attorney.
Roach praised developer Martin Ginsburg”™s City Square project now underway to remake the Westchester Financial Center at 50 Main St., diagonally across from the Metro-North train station, as a significant step in dealing with the sterility of the streets from the train station toward Mamaroneck Avenue.
“He is going back in time. He”™s going to add dining on Main Street, outdoor dining, restaurants,” Roach said.
Between Ginsburg”™s property and the City Center and shops and restaurants of Mamaroneck Avenue and other core downtown streets is the Galleria mall that has Macy”™s as an anchor store.
“I call it ”˜The Great Wall of Galleria,”™ ” Roach said. “When you walk up Main Street it just never ends and then when you turn onto Court Street it continues. When you take one side of a block and make it a blank wall, which is what Macy”™s is, you don”™t get the kind of true, organic nature of a street.”
There has been talk of plans being created for introducing new entertainment, experiential retail and design elements to the Galleria.
“I think we”™re getting close to when it will be more formal. There is great interest in the site and I think the intent would be to transform it. The Galleria when it was built served a function, but it”™s a megablock. It”™s just dropped into the city and if you look at it today it”™s one of those buildings that”™s always been successful on the inside but it”™s never been successful on the outside.”
THE TRAIN STATION
Also moving forward is the city”™s effort to attract development for three city-owned parcels and a White Plains Renewal Agency property near the train station. The parcels total approximately 4.5 acres and include two parking lots, a firehouse and the parking garage for the train station. The deadline for responses to a request for proposals (RFP) was Nov. 1, 2019.
“We got strong responses from very substantial developers,” Roach said. “It”™s in the review process here and we”™re looking forward to great things there.”
Gomez characterized the area as “one of the most sought-after development sites in the region.” He said, “Our next step is internal evaluation of the proposals and hopefully moving forward to interview the respondents.”
Gomez said the release of the RFP followed a 15-month public engagement process that included collecting community input on what should happen with the properties and in the general area of the train station.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), which owns Metro-North, is in the midst of a $92 million project to refurbish the White Plains station.
“I think the MTA and the state of New York recognized that our train station needed a lot more than just a cosmetic upgrade, which is what they had first proposed,” Roach said. “We are the No. 1 destination out of New York in the morning and the third-busiest station in the whole system.”
This is not the first time that development at the train station has been on the table. In 2007, developer Louis Cappelli proposed an $800 million project there, which would have included three office towers up to 475 feet in height, a 450-foot apartment building and a new 1,500-space garage. The Common Council declined to consider it.
Roach and Gomez emphasized the impact redevelopment of the White Plains Mall site could have on the city in general and the transit area in particular while noting that the approvals for the Hamilton Green project at the site recently lapsed but the developer asked that they be reinstated. The project would have 860 dwelling units in four buildings, 27,000 square feet of office space, 85,000 square feet of retail and 29,000 square feet of open plaza.
PARKING PERCEPTION
Roach acknowledged that one negative White Plains has yet to overcome is the way some people view its parking enforcement as overzealous. He said his administration has made it easier to avoid tickets through such things as a cellphone app that allows people to add time to a meter from wherever they happen to be. He noted that overtime fines in city garages are less than half of what they are at street meters.
“We have made it easier to avoid tickets but you know there”™s always going to be the guy that wants to roll the dice and you know the 99 times he comes out and he doesn”™t have a ticket he doesn”™t call me,” Roach said. “The time he does, he calls me. We really want you to follow the rules. The number of tickets issued has gone down because we”™ve provided more and more ways to avoid getting them.”
One place where White Plains has a growing positive image is with the motion picture and television industry. The city has been the site of numerous film and TV shoots, ranging from “The Godfather” to “The Wolf of Wall Street,” “Madam Secretary,” “The Girl on the Train,” Steven Spielberg”™s “The Post” and the current film by Martin Scorsese, “The Irishman.”
“Whenever a film shoot comes in there”™s a meeting in this conference room with the necessary city departments and the producers of the film to ensure that they have a smooth process and our residents and visitors are not inconvenienced,” Roach said.
He added that residents can submit photos of their houses to the city”™s film office if they”™d like to be considered by location scouts from the studios who call the city looking for places to film. Roach noted that residents, businesses and the local school system have made money from film and TV shoots.
Pointing to historic photos taken in White Plains that are displayed on the conference room walls, including ones showing horses and buggies clogging a downtown street, City Hall being dug out from a blizzard and the old RKO Theater on Main Street at Mamaroneck Avenue, Roach reminisced about having been born in the city.
“My family goes way back here. My kids are the fifth generation to live here,” Roach said. “To remain a success, you cannot take 1940 and put it in amber and expect to leave everything as it is. What I see for the future is not just a successful community for the economy but a city that truly lives together.”
