OP ED
The camel is sometimes jocularly described as a horse designed by a committee. Upon close examination, the zoning changes hastened into effect by the village board on December 7 as Local Law No. 4 turn out to be a veritable camel. Compared to the committee’s original recommendations, this addendum to the discredited Gateway Law is a miserable, mangy beast, a mere shadow of its former self. By no stretch of the imagination does this miscarriage of planning deserve the accolades heaped on it in recent congratulatory comments by supporters who obviously have not read it closely.
The third-floor of each new or remodeled building is reserved specifically for residential use, presumably to preclude any opportunistic retail discounter from renting there and advertising, “Walk up two flights and save.” Third-floor units could actually be more desirable, being farther from the odors wafting up from an exotic ethnic restaurant on the ground floor and its incessant music of cymbals, chimes and gongs. Similarly, the area behind ground-floor retail units is limited to residential use. But if living over a store is déclassé, what is living behind a store? One advantage: If you run out of sugar, you can always knock on the back door and borrow a cupful from your neighbor, the ever-smiling and obliging chef with the flashing cleaver. Can’t you see the hordes of young couples that will desert the Upper West Side and move to Croton to live in such desirable quarters? Fat chance.
The second floor may house any combination of retail and residential uses. Professional occupancy was originally an important part of the rental income formula of retail stores sharing space with professional offices and apartments. A felicitous amalgam intended to milk increased tax revenue from “revitalization,” it also conjured up images of lawyers’ clients stumbling over prams and strollers parked in the hallways. But not to worry. Such frictions will never come to pass. Professional offices are nowhere mentioned in the new law, which defines mixed use as “a combination of residential dwelling units and other permitted and/or special permit users.” I kid you not. It will be apartments and retailers plus whatever undefined “others” are able to pass muster with the Planning Board and receive special permits required from the Village Board of Trustees.
As if to emphasize Croton’s aggressive unfriendliness to commerce, the new law repeats the Gateway Law’s categories of banned legitimate businesses that are beyond the pale. In today’s hard times when we should be welcoming business of every stripe, Croton is like a panhandler insisting he will only accept a quarter if it’s a scarce collector’s commemorative coin. The recently enacted zoning changes do not represent intelligent planning; they are planning run amuck.
The earlier laughable Rube Goldberg concept of parking spaces shared between the various categories of tenants and customers has been quietly swept under the rug. In its place is a simple formula based on bedroom counts. Retailers will have to fall back on existing commercial district parking regulations—formulas that are notoriously inadequate, particularly for restaurant parking.
Advocates of the zoning change were loud in their criticism of the “dowdy” look of Harmon’s commercial area. A look I happen to like because of its quaintness and lack of pretension. In Harmon, what you see is what you get. Proponents promised that the zoning changes would alter that look, but don’t hold your breath. The committee’s original recommendations at least gave a nod to appearance in the following virtually unintelligible statement that “the third story must be designed to within the roofline and dormers, gables or other aesthetically pleasing design possibilities.”
The zoning changes say absolutely nothing about aesthetics. What they do say is, “buildings in the area shall be subject to such additional design guidelines as may be adopted by resolution of the Board of Trustees from time to time.” So, after all the fuss and bother, the vaunted zoning changes are revealed to be nothing more than a work in progress! Still to come are the inevitable onerous nit-picking regulations that are the bane of venture capital investment.
I can comfortably make a prediction: Local Law No. 4 of 2009 will bring as much new development capital to Harmon as the 2004 Gateway Law brought to Croton in almost six years—which is to say, zero, zip, zilch, nada, nothing. One year, five years, ten years from now, Harmon will look pretty much the way it does today. And we can all thank our lucky stars for that.
Readers interested in reading the text of the zoning changes adopted on December 7, 2009, as Local Law No. 4 will find it at the following link: http://www.crotononhudson-ny.gov/publicdocuments/crotonhudsonnywebdocs/2009-11-locallaw.pdf
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Croton's Cargo Cult Economics
OP ED
During the Second World War, the island of New Guinea was invaded first by the Japanese and then by Australian and American troops. Large amounts of supplies and war materiel were brought in by air, impressing the natives. Missionaries and colonial authorities normally present had been evacuated, and so the local villagers had no one to explain the significance of these large-scale war activities.
After the occupying troops departed at the conclusion of the war, religious cults sprang up in the belief that the goods brought in were originally intended for the native peoples and had been diverted by the foreigners. Leaders of these so-called “cargo cults” proclaimed that the manufactured goods of the invaders had been created spiritually by the natives’ own deities and ancestors, and were intended for them, but the foreigners had unfairly gained control of these objects by attracting the materials to themselves.
Examples of cargo cult activity included the clearing of mock airstrips in the jungle, construction of “hangars,” “offices” and “mess halls.” Western goods, such as “radios” made of coconuts and straw and “headphones” carved from wood, were used in mock control towers. Believers performed parade ground drills with wooden or salvaged rifles and painted their bodies with military and national insignia to look like soldiers, treating the activities of Western military personnel as rituals to attract the cargo. Having fabricated these items and performed the rituals, the cult members then waited patiently for the cargoes intended for them to arrive.
Croton will begin practicing its own form of what I call cargo cult economics at 7:30 p.m. next Tuesday. Letters have been sent out by the mayor to commercial property and business owners in Harmon inviting them to a meeting at the Kellerhouse Municipal Building. The Village’s website lists this as a meeting of the Economic Development Committee. Its purpose is to explain the opportunities under the recently passed zoning changes. Like suckers roped into attending a free time-share luncheon, attendees can expect to be pitched with an unrelenting spiel intended to encourage them to take advantage of the new law’s myriad of blessings.
Thus, the owner of a property with a retail establishment on the ground floor and an apartment on the floor above can undertake to raze the building and construct a new three-story structure closer to the sidewalk line. The advantage to those in adjoining residential areas behind the existing building is that the new building will be farther away. Left unsaid, undoubtedly, will be the fact that the space created will become an automobile parking lot.
Those who choose to remodel instead of rebuilding will have an equally daunting task. Most of the existing structures are what architects call “stick-built,” a method in which a sturdy skeleton of columns and beams was erected and then sheathed internally and externally. Because of the 35-foot total height limit, to create a third floor for an additional apartment, the heavy joists if the second floor attached to the building’s skeleton must be lowered, a major task, and additional third-floor joists, flooring and ceilings must be added above.
Rebuilt or remodeled, the resulting structures will not be inexpensive, In addition, business owners or apartment renters will have to vacate existing buildings during the process. The yield to the property owner in either case will be high building or remodeling costs, a higher assessment, higher taxes, and a third-floor walk-up apartment of doubtful desirability under the eaves. The added tax revenue for the Village will be negligible. So I say, “Welcome to cargo cult economics.” With outcomes like these, asking property owners to attend such a meeting is like asking a condemned man to bring the rope to his own hanging.
During the Second World War, the island of New Guinea was invaded first by the Japanese and then by Australian and American troops. Large amounts of supplies and war materiel were brought in by air, impressing the natives. Missionaries and colonial authorities normally present had been evacuated, and so the local villagers had no one to explain the significance of these large-scale war activities.
After the occupying troops departed at the conclusion of the war, religious cults sprang up in the belief that the goods brought in were originally intended for the native peoples and had been diverted by the foreigners. Leaders of these so-called “cargo cults” proclaimed that the manufactured goods of the invaders had been created spiritually by the natives’ own deities and ancestors, and were intended for them, but the foreigners had unfairly gained control of these objects by attracting the materials to themselves.
Examples of cargo cult activity included the clearing of mock airstrips in the jungle, construction of “hangars,” “offices” and “mess halls.” Western goods, such as “radios” made of coconuts and straw and “headphones” carved from wood, were used in mock control towers. Believers performed parade ground drills with wooden or salvaged rifles and painted their bodies with military and national insignia to look like soldiers, treating the activities of Western military personnel as rituals to attract the cargo. Having fabricated these items and performed the rituals, the cult members then waited patiently for the cargoes intended for them to arrive.
Croton will begin practicing its own form of what I call cargo cult economics at 7:30 p.m. next Tuesday. Letters have been sent out by the mayor to commercial property and business owners in Harmon inviting them to a meeting at the Kellerhouse Municipal Building. The Village’s website lists this as a meeting of the Economic Development Committee. Its purpose is to explain the opportunities under the recently passed zoning changes. Like suckers roped into attending a free time-share luncheon, attendees can expect to be pitched with an unrelenting spiel intended to encourage them to take advantage of the new law’s myriad of blessings.
Thus, the owner of a property with a retail establishment on the ground floor and an apartment on the floor above can undertake to raze the building and construct a new three-story structure closer to the sidewalk line. The advantage to those in adjoining residential areas behind the existing building is that the new building will be farther away. Left unsaid, undoubtedly, will be the fact that the space created will become an automobile parking lot.
Those who choose to remodel instead of rebuilding will have an equally daunting task. Most of the existing structures are what architects call “stick-built,” a method in which a sturdy skeleton of columns and beams was erected and then sheathed internally and externally. Because of the 35-foot total height limit, to create a third floor for an additional apartment, the heavy joists if the second floor attached to the building’s skeleton must be lowered, a major task, and additional third-floor joists, flooring and ceilings must be added above.
Rebuilt or remodeled, the resulting structures will not be inexpensive, In addition, business owners or apartment renters will have to vacate existing buildings during the process. The yield to the property owner in either case will be high building or remodeling costs, a higher assessment, higher taxes, and a third-floor walk-up apartment of doubtful desirability under the eaves. The added tax revenue for the Village will be negligible. So I say, “Welcome to cargo cult economics.” With outcomes like these, asking property owners to attend such a meeting is like asking a condemned man to bring the rope to his own hanging.
Thursday, November 19, 2009
The Coming Commercial Real Estate Disaster
OP ED
Thanks to Republican campaign ineptitude and widespread anti-incumbent backlash, Croton’s March election brought a rogue village board and a mayor intent on imposing zoning changes over the objections of many residents. Now we know what living under a one-party Stalinist or Maoist regime is like. Bruising litigation will inevitably follow. In the meantime, what else will happen? Nothing. In the almost six years since passage of the Gateway Law, not a single dollar has been spent in Croton by owners or developers of commercial properties. The same can be expected in Harmon under the zoning changes to that law.
Passage of the changes was a masterpiece of bad timing. Although the collapse of the residential real-estate market has been a disaster, “you ain’t seen nothing yet,” as entertainer Al Jolson used to say. A second bubble, this time in commercial real estate, is about to burst and sweep over the economy like a tidal wave, dooming development everywhere. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke hinted at this when he told a House committee last month, “Commercial real estate remains a serious problem.”
A significant indicator, quarterly returns on commercial property compiled by the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries, has been negative for the past five quarters, the longest continuous downturn since 1992. Beset by vacancies, owners of shopping malls, hotels, office space, apartment buildings and industrial sites—and the bankers who financed them—face crucial decisions over the next two years as the mortgages on these properties come due.
“A crisis of unprecedented proportions is approaching,” according to Dr. Randall Zisler, chief executive officer of Zisler Capital Partners LLC. Commercial property prices have fallen by 30 to 50 percent from their 2007 peaks, Zisler estimated in a recent report. This precipitous plunge has wiped out the equity in most real-estate deals based on debt financing since 2005.
Although the commercial real estate market is only about one-third the size of the $22 trillion residential market, its problems are considerably more serious. Home mortgages run for 15 to 30 years, but much of the $1.6 trillion in outstanding commercial real estate loans are for shorter terms of three to seven years. Many of these loans were written by bankers at the height of the boom. Zisler, whose firm specializes in real-estate investment, expects another $500 billion to $750 billion of mortgage debt to be added to that number as a result of “unscheduled maturities”—unanticipated defaults by owners of commercial properties—will bring the dollar amount at risk to well over two trillion.
“Unfortunately, traditional lenders of consequence are practically out of the market and massive amounts of maturing debt will not easily find refinancing,” Zisler pointed out. “Marking-to-market outstanding debt will render many banks, especially regional and community banks, insolvent, especially since much of the debt is likely worth about 50 percent of par, or less,” a consequence of having to reduce the value of their holdings.
According to FDIC data, commercial real estate made up 56 percent of U.S. banks’ loan portfolios in 2006. It was only 40 percent a decade earlier. For about 5,600 smaller banks with assets under $1 billion (about 90 percent of all U.S. banks) the percentage of loans secured by commercial real estate is even higher—74 percent.
In addition to vacancies and lost rents, those who bought commercial real estate at the height of the boom face the same dilemma as homeowners—plunging values. When their loans come due, they will owe more on the mortgage than the property is worth. Bankers call this “being upside down.” Owners have two choices: Sell and take a huge loss, or refinance and come up with a big bundle of cash to make up for the lost value.
Moreover, when decision time comes, many commercial property owners won’t have a sympathetic banker to talk to. Unhappy investors who bought bonds created by investment banks from bundled mortgages (Wall Street calls these “mortgage-backed securities”), or who bought bonds backed by the interest payments on them, hold about a third of all commercial loans.
Heavy losses on commercial real estate will cast a pall over consumer lending, causing banks to make home mortgages, car loans and credit cards even harder to obtain. It also will induce bankers to offset commercial loan losses by accelerating foreclosures and sales of foreclosed homes, thus putting additional downward pressure on home prices.
Traditional voter lassitude during local elections undoubtedly played a role in the voting that gave us the current lopsided administration. The next election is 120 days away. A village board with members more responsive to the will of the people would mark the beginning of the return to more proportional representation.
Thanks to Republican campaign ineptitude and widespread anti-incumbent backlash, Croton’s March election brought a rogue village board and a mayor intent on imposing zoning changes over the objections of many residents. Now we know what living under a one-party Stalinist or Maoist regime is like. Bruising litigation will inevitably follow. In the meantime, what else will happen? Nothing. In the almost six years since passage of the Gateway Law, not a single dollar has been spent in Croton by owners or developers of commercial properties. The same can be expected in Harmon under the zoning changes to that law.
Passage of the changes was a masterpiece of bad timing. Although the collapse of the residential real-estate market has been a disaster, “you ain’t seen nothing yet,” as entertainer Al Jolson used to say. A second bubble, this time in commercial real estate, is about to burst and sweep over the economy like a tidal wave, dooming development everywhere. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke hinted at this when he told a House committee last month, “Commercial real estate remains a serious problem.”
A significant indicator, quarterly returns on commercial property compiled by the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries, has been negative for the past five quarters, the longest continuous downturn since 1992. Beset by vacancies, owners of shopping malls, hotels, office space, apartment buildings and industrial sites—and the bankers who financed them—face crucial decisions over the next two years as the mortgages on these properties come due.
“A crisis of unprecedented proportions is approaching,” according to Dr. Randall Zisler, chief executive officer of Zisler Capital Partners LLC. Commercial property prices have fallen by 30 to 50 percent from their 2007 peaks, Zisler estimated in a recent report. This precipitous plunge has wiped out the equity in most real-estate deals based on debt financing since 2005.
Although the commercial real estate market is only about one-third the size of the $22 trillion residential market, its problems are considerably more serious. Home mortgages run for 15 to 30 years, but much of the $1.6 trillion in outstanding commercial real estate loans are for shorter terms of three to seven years. Many of these loans were written by bankers at the height of the boom. Zisler, whose firm specializes in real-estate investment, expects another $500 billion to $750 billion of mortgage debt to be added to that number as a result of “unscheduled maturities”—unanticipated defaults by owners of commercial properties—will bring the dollar amount at risk to well over two trillion.
“Unfortunately, traditional lenders of consequence are practically out of the market and massive amounts of maturing debt will not easily find refinancing,” Zisler pointed out. “Marking-to-market outstanding debt will render many banks, especially regional and community banks, insolvent, especially since much of the debt is likely worth about 50 percent of par, or less,” a consequence of having to reduce the value of their holdings.
According to FDIC data, commercial real estate made up 56 percent of U.S. banks’ loan portfolios in 2006. It was only 40 percent a decade earlier. For about 5,600 smaller banks with assets under $1 billion (about 90 percent of all U.S. banks) the percentage of loans secured by commercial real estate is even higher—74 percent.
In addition to vacancies and lost rents, those who bought commercial real estate at the height of the boom face the same dilemma as homeowners—plunging values. When their loans come due, they will owe more on the mortgage than the property is worth. Bankers call this “being upside down.” Owners have two choices: Sell and take a huge loss, or refinance and come up with a big bundle of cash to make up for the lost value.
Moreover, when decision time comes, many commercial property owners won’t have a sympathetic banker to talk to. Unhappy investors who bought bonds created by investment banks from bundled mortgages (Wall Street calls these “mortgage-backed securities”), or who bought bonds backed by the interest payments on them, hold about a third of all commercial loans.
Heavy losses on commercial real estate will cast a pall over consumer lending, causing banks to make home mortgages, car loans and credit cards even harder to obtain. It also will induce bankers to offset commercial loan losses by accelerating foreclosures and sales of foreclosed homes, thus putting additional downward pressure on home prices.
Traditional voter lassitude during local elections undoubtedly played a role in the voting that gave us the current lopsided administration. The next election is 120 days away. A village board with members more responsive to the will of the people would mark the beginning of the return to more proportional representation.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
The Natives Are Restless Tonight
OP ED
It has always been a travesty on the word “planning” for Croton to pursue a special zoning change to rescue an ailing Harmon from itself, while ignoring its other commercial areas also in need of support. Monday night’s public review only underscored this judgment. To propose piecemeal changes in Harmon while not having the faintest idea of the state of Croton’s commercial (i.e., retail) economy borders on the criminal.
Proponents blithely continue to close their eyes to the realities of geography, the isolating Expressway, Croton’s small customer base and especially its five noncontiguous shopping areas that make the development of a central shopping area an impossibility. Encouragement of tourism to aid local businesses is never considered. Yet it would cost almost nothing and require no enabling legislation.
The plan’s basic objective is to get the Harmon shopping area to pull up its socks, so to speak, all the while ignoring Croton’s other troubled shopping areas. Proponents claim that Harmon is unattractive, but could be transformed into a veritable Fifth Avenue of strolling families and shopping activity through the simple medium of a zoning change. Whenever someone starts by saying, “Friends who come to visit immediately remark on how awful the Harmon shopping area looks,” you know the baloney is going to be sliced very thick. Why aren’t proponents equally concerned about the Upper Village that has at its heart a shuttered, highly visible and starkly empty Wondrous Things storefront?
No matter what we do to zoning in Harmon, as a nascent Fifth Avenue it is always going to be “blighted” (their word, not mine) by three gasoline service stations and an automobile body repair and repainting shop in close proximity along one side of South Riverside Avenue. I am not for a moment suggesting that these businesses should go. They are necessary, profitable and very much a part of Harmon, plus they offer local employment opportunities. But how their continuing presence is going to make the “revitalized” Harmon shopping area look like a cross between the Champs Élysées and the Las Vegas strip is never explained.
The standing-room-only crowd at the meeting was unified and vociferously loud in its opposition. Only after the anti-zoning-change speakers had drifted away did a few timorous advocates, largely from areas other than Harmon, show themselves. Offering little in the way of concrete support, the best they could muster was “Why not give it a try?” as though the ill-considered zoning change were nothing more than a faddish TV 30-day dieting plan.
Croton can be thankful it has more lawyers in residence than nail salons and pizzerias. Early on, the opposition unlimbered some big legal guns to advance their cause, and these were hard acts to follow. Legal objections to the Environmental Assessment Form, in fact to the entire process itself, flew thick and fast. Village attorney James Staudt, who is not a resident and who had given a perfunctory blessing to the plan at the start of the meeting, could hardly have felt comfortable under the barrage of citations. Then again, litigation always brings humongous hourly billings, a factor proponents should keep in mind. Memories of the legal cost of ousting Metro-Enviro still rankle.
The rezoning plan has been shown to be fraught with faults and legal hazards. For the mayor and village board to move this plan forward without addressing these would be the height of irresponsibility. At the very least, they should be required to prove that each defect has been considered and corrected. Last March’s election was by no means a landslide. The two incumbents up for re-election would be wise to recognize that reality. Next March is only four months away.
It has always been a travesty on the word “planning” for Croton to pursue a special zoning change to rescue an ailing Harmon from itself, while ignoring its other commercial areas also in need of support. Monday night’s public review only underscored this judgment. To propose piecemeal changes in Harmon while not having the faintest idea of the state of Croton’s commercial (i.e., retail) economy borders on the criminal.
Proponents blithely continue to close their eyes to the realities of geography, the isolating Expressway, Croton’s small customer base and especially its five noncontiguous shopping areas that make the development of a central shopping area an impossibility. Encouragement of tourism to aid local businesses is never considered. Yet it would cost almost nothing and require no enabling legislation.
The plan’s basic objective is to get the Harmon shopping area to pull up its socks, so to speak, all the while ignoring Croton’s other troubled shopping areas. Proponents claim that Harmon is unattractive, but could be transformed into a veritable Fifth Avenue of strolling families and shopping activity through the simple medium of a zoning change. Whenever someone starts by saying, “Friends who come to visit immediately remark on how awful the Harmon shopping area looks,” you know the baloney is going to be sliced very thick. Why aren’t proponents equally concerned about the Upper Village that has at its heart a shuttered, highly visible and starkly empty Wondrous Things storefront?
No matter what we do to zoning in Harmon, as a nascent Fifth Avenue it is always going to be “blighted” (their word, not mine) by three gasoline service stations and an automobile body repair and repainting shop in close proximity along one side of South Riverside Avenue. I am not for a moment suggesting that these businesses should go. They are necessary, profitable and very much a part of Harmon, plus they offer local employment opportunities. But how their continuing presence is going to make the “revitalized” Harmon shopping area look like a cross between the Champs Élysées and the Las Vegas strip is never explained.
The standing-room-only crowd at the meeting was unified and vociferously loud in its opposition. Only after the anti-zoning-change speakers had drifted away did a few timorous advocates, largely from areas other than Harmon, show themselves. Offering little in the way of concrete support, the best they could muster was “Why not give it a try?” as though the ill-considered zoning change were nothing more than a faddish TV 30-day dieting plan.
Croton can be thankful it has more lawyers in residence than nail salons and pizzerias. Early on, the opposition unlimbered some big legal guns to advance their cause, and these were hard acts to follow. Legal objections to the Environmental Assessment Form, in fact to the entire process itself, flew thick and fast. Village attorney James Staudt, who is not a resident and who had given a perfunctory blessing to the plan at the start of the meeting, could hardly have felt comfortable under the barrage of citations. Then again, litigation always brings humongous hourly billings, a factor proponents should keep in mind. Memories of the legal cost of ousting Metro-Enviro still rankle.
The rezoning plan has been shown to be fraught with faults and legal hazards. For the mayor and village board to move this plan forward without addressing these would be the height of irresponsibility. At the very least, they should be required to prove that each defect has been considered and corrected. Last March’s election was by no means a landslide. The two incumbents up for re-election would be wise to recognize that reality. Next March is only four months away.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Mixed (Up) Use Coming to Croton
OP ED
Croton today is on the brink of making a major decision. The subject at issue is mixed use. And what is mixed use? In Colonial America it was the way of life in towns and villages. It featured a tightly clustered mix of stores, houses, churches, local government buildings, and civic uses within walking distance of one another.
During the 19th century industrialization brought factories and commercial uses that were sources of objectionable noise and odors, and often were hazardous to public health. To protect residential property values, early zoning focused on separating uses and buffering them from each other to minimize nuisances. The movement to return to mixed use in urban areas was sparked by Jane Jacobs in her seminal 1961 work titled The Death and Life of Great American Cities.
Paradoxically, Croton’s existing zoning permits mixed use in the form of housing on a single floor above retail stores. Proposed legislation would more than double the amount of residential space available in commercially zoned areas as apartments above retail establishments and in ground-floor space behind them. I have been a vocal opponent of this legislation on many grounds:
(1) The total lack of research into the current retail picture in Croton. It may very well be that Croton needs less retail space rather than more.
(2) The failure of proponents to explore the impact of the legislation on the projected school population.
(3) The inadequacy of parking and the lack of outdoor space for children and pets. Because of higher densities in mixed-use developments and the commercial/office component, parking space requirements always exceed those of residential development.
(4) The total lack of adequate controls to protect the village. This mirrors the 2004 Gateway Law that bans fast-food restaurants without defining what constitutes a fast-food restaurant.
(5) The total lack of architectural standards. The only architectural requirement in the Harmon report was that the third floor within the roofline be designed as “dormers, or gables, or other architecturally pleasing design possibilities.” Even this vague and unsatisfactory requirement is missing from the proposed legislation.
(6) Technically naïve, the proposed legislation also provides for ground floor residential space behind retail space. Yet any first-year architectural student knows that retail and residential ceiling heights vary greatly and mixing them on one floor will impose additional design and construction costs. The large, high-ceilinged ground floor space without supporting columns needed for commercial uses may not be architecturally compatible with the smaller scale of walled residential space above it or behind it.
(7) Construction costs for mixed-use development currently exceed those for single-use buildings of similar size. Unanticipated architectural challenges include fire separations, sound attenuation, ventilation and egress.
(8) Mixed use developments are seen as too risky by many developers and lending institutions because economic success requires that the several different uses all remain in full occupancy. Short-term discounted cash flow has become the standard method of measuring the success of income-producing properties, making single-use properties more attractive for investment.
(9) There has been a total lack of cost analysis and feasibility studies, yet the legislation is touted as an economic panacea for Croton.
With so many issues still unaddressed, I urge all residents of Croton to turn out at the village board meeting on November 2 and demand an answer to the simple question, “Why the hurry and the mindless disregard of citizens’ legitimate concerns?”
Croton today is on the brink of making a major decision. The subject at issue is mixed use. And what is mixed use? In Colonial America it was the way of life in towns and villages. It featured a tightly clustered mix of stores, houses, churches, local government buildings, and civic uses within walking distance of one another.
During the 19th century industrialization brought factories and commercial uses that were sources of objectionable noise and odors, and often were hazardous to public health. To protect residential property values, early zoning focused on separating uses and buffering them from each other to minimize nuisances. The movement to return to mixed use in urban areas was sparked by Jane Jacobs in her seminal 1961 work titled The Death and Life of Great American Cities.
Paradoxically, Croton’s existing zoning permits mixed use in the form of housing on a single floor above retail stores. Proposed legislation would more than double the amount of residential space available in commercially zoned areas as apartments above retail establishments and in ground-floor space behind them. I have been a vocal opponent of this legislation on many grounds:
(1) The total lack of research into the current retail picture in Croton. It may very well be that Croton needs less retail space rather than more.
(2) The failure of proponents to explore the impact of the legislation on the projected school population.
(3) The inadequacy of parking and the lack of outdoor space for children and pets. Because of higher densities in mixed-use developments and the commercial/office component, parking space requirements always exceed those of residential development.
(4) The total lack of adequate controls to protect the village. This mirrors the 2004 Gateway Law that bans fast-food restaurants without defining what constitutes a fast-food restaurant.
(5) The total lack of architectural standards. The only architectural requirement in the Harmon report was that the third floor within the roofline be designed as “dormers, or gables, or other architecturally pleasing design possibilities.” Even this vague and unsatisfactory requirement is missing from the proposed legislation.
(6) Technically naïve, the proposed legislation also provides for ground floor residential space behind retail space. Yet any first-year architectural student knows that retail and residential ceiling heights vary greatly and mixing them on one floor will impose additional design and construction costs. The large, high-ceilinged ground floor space without supporting columns needed for commercial uses may not be architecturally compatible with the smaller scale of walled residential space above it or behind it.
(7) Construction costs for mixed-use development currently exceed those for single-use buildings of similar size. Unanticipated architectural challenges include fire separations, sound attenuation, ventilation and egress.
(8) Mixed use developments are seen as too risky by many developers and lending institutions because economic success requires that the several different uses all remain in full occupancy. Short-term discounted cash flow has become the standard method of measuring the success of income-producing properties, making single-use properties more attractive for investment.
(9) There has been a total lack of cost analysis and feasibility studies, yet the legislation is touted as an economic panacea for Croton.
With so many issues still unaddressed, I urge all residents of Croton to turn out at the village board meeting on November 2 and demand an answer to the simple question, “Why the hurry and the mindless disregard of citizens’ legitimate concerns?”
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Putting the Gateway Law Under a Microscope
OP ED
The Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution and Croton’s 2004 Gateway law all have one quality in common: Very few people have read them. I urge residents to study the Gateway Law, which plays a fundamental role in proposed Harmon committee changes. It’s available on Croton’s website as part of its Zoning Code.
Let’s consider first how the Gateway Law defines and identifies what it calls its commercial gateways. These are clearly characterized as “the major entry points from surrounding municipalities and roads.” But ask Croton’s residents to list entry points under this definition, and they will invariably name four: the three exits to Croton from the north-south Expressway (Route 9). They will also definitely include Route 129 coming from the east.
Peculiarly, the Gateway Law identifies only three gateways. The first two are the Croton Point Avenue and the Municipal Place exits from the Expressway. The third is a most unusual choice: “the north end of the village along Albany Post Road (Route 9A).”
The reasons for excluding two very significant gateways that meet the Gateway Law’s own definition have never been satisfactorily explained. Unmentioned are the Senasqua Road gateway leading to the remnant Lower Village shopping area, and the similarly overlooked Route 129 gateway from Yorktown leading directly to the Grand Street shopping area.
The reason for including the Albany Post Road at the extreme north end of the village as a gateway into the Village is equally unclear. Few southbound motorists use it, preferring the Expressway. By any definition, the Senasqua Road exit is the first true gateway from the Expressway into the commercial areas of Croton. Yet Gateway Law framers ignored it.
Curiously, planners who claim to have the cure for what ails commerce in Croton have never seen fit to post a sign at the branching of Grand Street from Route 129 (Maple Street) directing motorists to “Business district” or “Shopping area.” Under the Gateway Law, the Grand Street shopping area simply does not exist.
New York State traffic statistics show that Route 129 (Maple Street) funnels two million vehicles through Croton annually. As if to underscore that Croton considers Route 129 a gateway, it has erected a very large sign on Route 129 near Jacoby Street at the entrance to the village.
Does this handsome sign bid welcome to motorists entering our fair village by pointing out Croton’s rich historical heritage? It does not. With the supreme lack of imagination so characteristic of Croton’s planning, it says, “Croton-on-Hudson. Incorporated 1898.” Before any makeover of the so-called Gateway Law is attempted, the glaring omission of two major gateways should be corrected.
The Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution and Croton’s 2004 Gateway law all have one quality in common: Very few people have read them. I urge residents to study the Gateway Law, which plays a fundamental role in proposed Harmon committee changes. It’s available on Croton’s website as part of its Zoning Code.
Let’s consider first how the Gateway Law defines and identifies what it calls its commercial gateways. These are clearly characterized as “the major entry points from surrounding municipalities and roads.” But ask Croton’s residents to list entry points under this definition, and they will invariably name four: the three exits to Croton from the north-south Expressway (Route 9). They will also definitely include Route 129 coming from the east.
Peculiarly, the Gateway Law identifies only three gateways. The first two are the Croton Point Avenue and the Municipal Place exits from the Expressway. The third is a most unusual choice: “the north end of the village along Albany Post Road (Route 9A).”
The reasons for excluding two very significant gateways that meet the Gateway Law’s own definition have never been satisfactorily explained. Unmentioned are the Senasqua Road gateway leading to the remnant Lower Village shopping area, and the similarly overlooked Route 129 gateway from Yorktown leading directly to the Grand Street shopping area.
The reason for including the Albany Post Road at the extreme north end of the village as a gateway into the Village is equally unclear. Few southbound motorists use it, preferring the Expressway. By any definition, the Senasqua Road exit is the first true gateway from the Expressway into the commercial areas of Croton. Yet Gateway Law framers ignored it.
Curiously, planners who claim to have the cure for what ails commerce in Croton have never seen fit to post a sign at the branching of Grand Street from Route 129 (Maple Street) directing motorists to “Business district” or “Shopping area.” Under the Gateway Law, the Grand Street shopping area simply does not exist.
New York State traffic statistics show that Route 129 (Maple Street) funnels two million vehicles through Croton annually. As if to underscore that Croton considers Route 129 a gateway, it has erected a very large sign on Route 129 near Jacoby Street at the entrance to the village.
Does this handsome sign bid welcome to motorists entering our fair village by pointing out Croton’s rich historical heritage? It does not. With the supreme lack of imagination so characteristic of Croton’s planning, it says, “Croton-on-Hudson. Incorporated 1898.” Before any makeover of the so-called Gateway Law is attempted, the glaring omission of two major gateways should be corrected.
Bob Elliott on Heritage Tourism
OP ED
Given that tourism is New York State’s second largest industry, I expected the broad plan I described last week to receive wide acceptance. As usual, a small coterie of anonymous proponents of the Harmon Plan pooh-poohed it, arguing wildly that it would not work. No respectable newspaper will publish unsigned, irresponsible comments. Initially, the plan only requires integrating Croton more closely with existing organizations to promote the new trend called “heritage tourism.”
I’d like to call a single expert witness in defense of tourism as a solution worth trying. Robert W. Elliott, seven-term mayor of Croton-on-Hudson from 1991 to 2005, and founder and past chairman of Historic River Towns of Westchester, a consortium of thirteen river communities from Yonkers to Peekskill. Under an inter-municipal agreement, this umbrella organization focuses on waterfront development, tourism and main street economics in a bottom-up approach to regional planning.
Bob Elliott authored the New York Conference of Mayors Sustainable Communities Initiative. He is the former Chair of the Hudson Valley Tourism Development Council and served as the Vice Chair of the New York Main Street Alliance. He has been the Director of Economic Development, as well as head of the Industrial Development Agency for Westchester County. Bob was also President of the Westchester Convention and Visitors Bureau. I’m sure readers will acknowledge his credentials.
On April 4, 2005, while still the mayor of Croton, Bob spoke on the subject of tourism at Buffalo’s Martin House Restoration. A five-building complex designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in his Prairie Style and built from 1903-05, this powerful architectural magnet attracts visitors from all over the country. No transcript exists of Bob’s presentation, but a Buffalo News reporter was there, and his news story captured some of the highlights.
Mayor Elliott described how communities in a picturesque 50-mile stretch along the Hudson River are working together, without being restricted by geographical or organizational divisions, with the objective of offsetting job losses and economic stagnation that have afflicted much of upstate New York. According to him, a major thrust of this “bottom-up approach to regional planning” has been the development of heritage tourism as an economic lifeline.
This makes eminent good sense, Bob pointed out. Tourism is the state’s second largest industry, and local governments (except in Croton) and groups are working together to promote the region’s history to older, middle-class travelers who constitute the primary market for heritage tourism. The special breed of “heritage tourists” stays longer, visits twice as many places and spends twice as much. “They’ve even come to see the Hudson itself as a tourist draw,” he added.
As part of his slideshow, he projected a color slide of the Half Moon on the screen, the brightly colored replica of explorer Henry Hudson’s little ship, under full sail. Above the photo, the caption read: “It’s the river, stupid.” He closed with, “It’s one aspect of regionalism that has been proven to work.”
The defense rests.
Given that tourism is New York State’s second largest industry, I expected the broad plan I described last week to receive wide acceptance. As usual, a small coterie of anonymous proponents of the Harmon Plan pooh-poohed it, arguing wildly that it would not work. No respectable newspaper will publish unsigned, irresponsible comments. Initially, the plan only requires integrating Croton more closely with existing organizations to promote the new trend called “heritage tourism.”
I’d like to call a single expert witness in defense of tourism as a solution worth trying. Robert W. Elliott, seven-term mayor of Croton-on-Hudson from 1991 to 2005, and founder and past chairman of Historic River Towns of Westchester, a consortium of thirteen river communities from Yonkers to Peekskill. Under an inter-municipal agreement, this umbrella organization focuses on waterfront development, tourism and main street economics in a bottom-up approach to regional planning.
Bob Elliott authored the New York Conference of Mayors Sustainable Communities Initiative. He is the former Chair of the Hudson Valley Tourism Development Council and served as the Vice Chair of the New York Main Street Alliance. He has been the Director of Economic Development, as well as head of the Industrial Development Agency for Westchester County. Bob was also President of the Westchester Convention and Visitors Bureau. I’m sure readers will acknowledge his credentials.
On April 4, 2005, while still the mayor of Croton, Bob spoke on the subject of tourism at Buffalo’s Martin House Restoration. A five-building complex designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in his Prairie Style and built from 1903-05, this powerful architectural magnet attracts visitors from all over the country. No transcript exists of Bob’s presentation, but a Buffalo News reporter was there, and his news story captured some of the highlights.
Mayor Elliott described how communities in a picturesque 50-mile stretch along the Hudson River are working together, without being restricted by geographical or organizational divisions, with the objective of offsetting job losses and economic stagnation that have afflicted much of upstate New York. According to him, a major thrust of this “bottom-up approach to regional planning” has been the development of heritage tourism as an economic lifeline.
This makes eminent good sense, Bob pointed out. Tourism is the state’s second largest industry, and local governments (except in Croton) and groups are working together to promote the region’s history to older, middle-class travelers who constitute the primary market for heritage tourism. The special breed of “heritage tourists” stays longer, visits twice as many places and spends twice as much. “They’ve even come to see the Hudson itself as a tourist draw,” he added.
As part of his slideshow, he projected a color slide of the Half Moon on the screen, the brightly colored replica of explorer Henry Hudson’s little ship, under full sail. Above the photo, the caption read: “It’s the river, stupid.” He closed with, “It’s one aspect of regionalism that has been proven to work.”
The defense rests.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
An Untapped Asset: Croton's Rich History Could Be Its Salvation
OP ED
Readers may be interested in the following transcript of a question-and-answer session I recently had with myself:
Q: Okay, Mr. Wise Guy, you’ve been critical of unneeded zoning changes, what’s your solution for Croton’s economic ills?
A: The answer has been right under our noses from the beginning: Old-fashioned tourism. Give people a reason to “Visit Historic Croton-on-Hudson.” and they’ll come in droves.
Q: What’s the first step?
A: We have the nucleus in Van Cortlandt Manor to cover the Dutch colonial period. The Village should acquire and restore the nearby original Harmon sales office. Make it a visitors’ center and a Croton Museum of History with permanent exhibits about Croton’s long history of boat building, railroading, brick making, and construction of the Old Croton Aqueduct and the Croton Dam.
Q: What comes next?
A: Special exhibits can be added, such as one honoring Croton’s African-American heritage. Revolutionary War cannoneer John Peterson, whose unerring aim began the downfall of British spy, Major John André, and playwright Lorraine Hansberry (“A Raisin in the Sun”) are both buried in Bethel Cemetery.
Q: What other attractions could there be?
A: Perhaps Metro North could be induced to establish a railroad (and trolley) museum here. (The Metro Enviro site would be ideal.) Croton should explore the possibility that the colorful replica of Henry Hudson’s ship, the Half Moon, could make Croton its homeport and wintering port.
Q: Isn’t Croton’s rich history already widely recognized?
A: Not at all. Historic sites are unmarked. Would you believe there’s only one marker in the village memorializing its historic past? Most Crotonites cannot name that lone marker. (It’s at the base of the hill on which Bethel Chapel stands.) There are more than a dozen houses in Croton associated with the Bohemian colony of artists and writers that flourished here during and after the First World War. Yet not a single marker identifies any of these houses, which would make a fine subject for a walking tour.
Q: How would you overcome Croton’s handicap of widely separated shopping areas?
A: That’s easy. In keeping with the image of a tourist-friendly village, Croton’s shopping areas could be gradually nudged toward specialization. For example, Grand Street could emulate Cold Spring’s Main Street and feature shops offering antiques and knickknacks. And attract customers to its restaurants.
Q: What about places where tourists can stay?
A: The big hurdle is lack of hotel space. For year-round tourism, a hotel/conference center with a river view could easily be built on a commercial site like the tire warehouse. The railroad’s fast express train service opens up the possibility that Metro North could promote tours to Croton from New York City as package deals.
Q: What should we do about the Gateway Law?
A: Cosmetic changes will do nothing to bring new business. We must stop excluding legitimate businesses. It’s positively un-American to convict a whole class of businesses without a trial. Let’s make Croton a village that genuinely welcomes businesses. We must halt any attempt to urbanize Croton. Don’t expand the Gateway Law. Get rid of it.
Q: What are the chances of such a plan coming to fruition?
A: Good, if Croton will stop bickering and recognize that exploitation of its history can be its salvation.
Readers may be interested in the following transcript of a question-and-answer session I recently had with myself:
Q: Okay, Mr. Wise Guy, you’ve been critical of unneeded zoning changes, what’s your solution for Croton’s economic ills?
A: The answer has been right under our noses from the beginning: Old-fashioned tourism. Give people a reason to “Visit Historic Croton-on-Hudson.” and they’ll come in droves.
Q: What’s the first step?
A: We have the nucleus in Van Cortlandt Manor to cover the Dutch colonial period. The Village should acquire and restore the nearby original Harmon sales office. Make it a visitors’ center and a Croton Museum of History with permanent exhibits about Croton’s long history of boat building, railroading, brick making, and construction of the Old Croton Aqueduct and the Croton Dam.
Q: What comes next?
A: Special exhibits can be added, such as one honoring Croton’s African-American heritage. Revolutionary War cannoneer John Peterson, whose unerring aim began the downfall of British spy, Major John André, and playwright Lorraine Hansberry (“A Raisin in the Sun”) are both buried in Bethel Cemetery.
Q: What other attractions could there be?
A: Perhaps Metro North could be induced to establish a railroad (and trolley) museum here. (The Metro Enviro site would be ideal.) Croton should explore the possibility that the colorful replica of Henry Hudson’s ship, the Half Moon, could make Croton its homeport and wintering port.
Q: Isn’t Croton’s rich history already widely recognized?
A: Not at all. Historic sites are unmarked. Would you believe there’s only one marker in the village memorializing its historic past? Most Crotonites cannot name that lone marker. (It’s at the base of the hill on which Bethel Chapel stands.) There are more than a dozen houses in Croton associated with the Bohemian colony of artists and writers that flourished here during and after the First World War. Yet not a single marker identifies any of these houses, which would make a fine subject for a walking tour.
Q: How would you overcome Croton’s handicap of widely separated shopping areas?
A: That’s easy. In keeping with the image of a tourist-friendly village, Croton’s shopping areas could be gradually nudged toward specialization. For example, Grand Street could emulate Cold Spring’s Main Street and feature shops offering antiques and knickknacks. And attract customers to its restaurants.
Q: What about places where tourists can stay?
A: The big hurdle is lack of hotel space. For year-round tourism, a hotel/conference center with a river view could easily be built on a commercial site like the tire warehouse. The railroad’s fast express train service opens up the possibility that Metro North could promote tours to Croton from New York City as package deals.
Q: What should we do about the Gateway Law?
A: Cosmetic changes will do nothing to bring new business. We must stop excluding legitimate businesses. It’s positively un-American to convict a whole class of businesses without a trial. Let’s make Croton a village that genuinely welcomes businesses. We must halt any attempt to urbanize Croton. Don’t expand the Gateway Law. Get rid of it.
Q: What are the chances of such a plan coming to fruition?
A: Good, if Croton will stop bickering and recognize that exploitation of its history can be its salvation.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Painful Truths about Croton Planning
OP ED
In planning Croton’s future, three indisputable facts cannot be changed:
(1) The Expressway has effectively made Croton a backwater by cutting it off from the flow of north-south automobile traffic, estimated at 40,000 vehicles a day. Each transit by a motorist bypassing our village at 55 mph means one less potential customer for Croton businesses.
(2) Croton lacks a single, centralized shopping area. Over the years, Croton planners allowed five widely separated and non-contiguous shopping areas to evolve, each heavily dependent on the automobile. Pedestrian traffic between the respective shopping areas is nonexistent because of their wide separation.
(3) Croton planners also allowed its downtown to be blighted with three giant supermarkets and their large, unsightly automobile parking areas. These encourage automobile usage and further discourage pedestrian traffic.
This may not be a picture of “the Croton we want.” Nevertheless, it’s the Croton we’ve got, and we must make the best of an unhappy situation. Planners must accept that the above special conditions make Croton different from other villages. I don’t care how many communities with centralized shopping areas our expensive hired consultants may have advised; they cannot overcome Croton’s atypical handicaps. Otherwise, any monies spent will be wasted.
Planners must stop treating Croton as a community with conventional planning problems. They should accept Croton’s unusual situation before plunging ahead with off-the-shelf, standard-issue solutions. Merely giving Harmon a hasty cosmetic makeover that violates common sense is not planning.
I have railed against the flawed 2004 Gateway Law now incorporated into the Zoning Code and against the proposed Harmon-inspired changes to it. Its proponents have stubbornly clung to flagrantly erroneous beliefs: (1) that planning efforts should be concentrated on a single shopping area at the expense of the other areas; (2) that there are three magical, mystical “gateways” to Croton; (3) that all motorists who enter Croton are here to shop, so Croton must be made pretty for such shoppers from other communities.
Every community has its delicatessens, pizza parlors, supermarkets, hardware store, branch bank, and post office supplying basic needs of its residents. Croton’s underlying problem is that it lacks a “magnet” store or stores that would attract customers from elsewhere. Briarcliff Manor's Chilmark shopping center, for example, has a Radio Shack. When I need an electronic gadget, I travel there. After a brief existence here, Croton’s sole magnet store, Blockbuster, is now in the process of closing.
The only businesses that manage to thrive here are those that supply basic needs—“the butcher, baker and candlestick maker.” Ironically, Croton’s Gateway Law specifically bans automobile dealerships and national chain fast food restaurants. Yet each of these categories represents a magnet business with the potential of attracting the very customers from other communities that Croton sorely needs.
The truth is Croton planners lack basic knowledge of the community so necessary for intelligent planning. Croton has no inventory of the stores, empty or occupied, in each of Croton’s five shopping areas. We have no idea of their sizes, amenities, and rental terms or even what they offer in the way of goods and services. Hard to believe, but no planner can identify how many delicatessens, restaurants, pizza parlors, or nail salons exist in Croton, nor can they tell me where they are located.
Equally nonexistent is a reliable, controlled census and projections of its school population and expected growth. Croton has no idea of the number of apartments that exist in the village, yet planners are contemplating adding more apartments in crowded human rabbit warrens. School taxes form the major portion of each taxpayer’s tax burden.
That planners in Croton should be actively engaged in planning for this village’s future despite their lack of fundamental knowledge about the nature and state of its current business and residential communities is staggering, to say the least. What Croton needs is more information, not more legislation.
Croton and other communities in Westchester have just been dealt a double whammy. One is the workforce legislation calling for mandatory affordable housing now awaiting the governor’s signature. The other is the agreement recently reached between the county executive and the federal government mandating affordable housing for minorities. The fact that Croton receives no credit for the impressive results achieved by the Croton Housing Network is only one of the many disquieting aspects of the wrenching changes.
Apparently unforeseen by the Village, the two events in quick succession came as a complete surprise. Until the questions they raise are answered, it would be suicidal for Croton’s present administration to push ahead mulishly in its headlong rush to expand the flawed Gateway Law by adding apartments whose need is highly questionable. Its first order of business should be to fill the enormous gap in information about the nature of the ventures that manage to thrive in the village and the future burdens on its school system.
In planning Croton’s future, three indisputable facts cannot be changed:
(1) The Expressway has effectively made Croton a backwater by cutting it off from the flow of north-south automobile traffic, estimated at 40,000 vehicles a day. Each transit by a motorist bypassing our village at 55 mph means one less potential customer for Croton businesses.
(2) Croton lacks a single, centralized shopping area. Over the years, Croton planners allowed five widely separated and non-contiguous shopping areas to evolve, each heavily dependent on the automobile. Pedestrian traffic between the respective shopping areas is nonexistent because of their wide separation.
(3) Croton planners also allowed its downtown to be blighted with three giant supermarkets and their large, unsightly automobile parking areas. These encourage automobile usage and further discourage pedestrian traffic.
This may not be a picture of “the Croton we want.” Nevertheless, it’s the Croton we’ve got, and we must make the best of an unhappy situation. Planners must accept that the above special conditions make Croton different from other villages. I don’t care how many communities with centralized shopping areas our expensive hired consultants may have advised; they cannot overcome Croton’s atypical handicaps. Otherwise, any monies spent will be wasted.
Planners must stop treating Croton as a community with conventional planning problems. They should accept Croton’s unusual situation before plunging ahead with off-the-shelf, standard-issue solutions. Merely giving Harmon a hasty cosmetic makeover that violates common sense is not planning.
I have railed against the flawed 2004 Gateway Law now incorporated into the Zoning Code and against the proposed Harmon-inspired changes to it. Its proponents have stubbornly clung to flagrantly erroneous beliefs: (1) that planning efforts should be concentrated on a single shopping area at the expense of the other areas; (2) that there are three magical, mystical “gateways” to Croton; (3) that all motorists who enter Croton are here to shop, so Croton must be made pretty for such shoppers from other communities.
Every community has its delicatessens, pizza parlors, supermarkets, hardware store, branch bank, and post office supplying basic needs of its residents. Croton’s underlying problem is that it lacks a “magnet” store or stores that would attract customers from elsewhere. Briarcliff Manor's Chilmark shopping center, for example, has a Radio Shack. When I need an electronic gadget, I travel there. After a brief existence here, Croton’s sole magnet store, Blockbuster, is now in the process of closing.
The only businesses that manage to thrive here are those that supply basic needs—“the butcher, baker and candlestick maker.” Ironically, Croton’s Gateway Law specifically bans automobile dealerships and national chain fast food restaurants. Yet each of these categories represents a magnet business with the potential of attracting the very customers from other communities that Croton sorely needs.
The truth is Croton planners lack basic knowledge of the community so necessary for intelligent planning. Croton has no inventory of the stores, empty or occupied, in each of Croton’s five shopping areas. We have no idea of their sizes, amenities, and rental terms or even what they offer in the way of goods and services. Hard to believe, but no planner can identify how many delicatessens, restaurants, pizza parlors, or nail salons exist in Croton, nor can they tell me where they are located.
Equally nonexistent is a reliable, controlled census and projections of its school population and expected growth. Croton has no idea of the number of apartments that exist in the village, yet planners are contemplating adding more apartments in crowded human rabbit warrens. School taxes form the major portion of each taxpayer’s tax burden.
That planners in Croton should be actively engaged in planning for this village’s future despite their lack of fundamental knowledge about the nature and state of its current business and residential communities is staggering, to say the least. What Croton needs is more information, not more legislation.
Croton and other communities in Westchester have just been dealt a double whammy. One is the workforce legislation calling for mandatory affordable housing now awaiting the governor’s signature. The other is the agreement recently reached between the county executive and the federal government mandating affordable housing for minorities. The fact that Croton receives no credit for the impressive results achieved by the Croton Housing Network is only one of the many disquieting aspects of the wrenching changes.
Apparently unforeseen by the Village, the two events in quick succession came as a complete surprise. Until the questions they raise are answered, it would be suicidal for Croton’s present administration to push ahead mulishly in its headlong rush to expand the flawed Gateway Law by adding apartments whose need is highly questionable. Its first order of business should be to fill the enormous gap in information about the nature of the ventures that manage to thrive in the village and the future burdens on its school system.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Strange Doings in the Name of Zoning
OP ED
Continuing a detailed study of the flawed Gateway Law to which zoning changes will be added, here are a few of the Law’s flaws that professional planners have already bestowed on us: (References to the Gateway Law hereafter will be to “the Law.”)
Flaw No. 1 is in the fallacious concept that if we “upgrade the image and strengthen the visual identity of the Village,” visitors will automatically come to Croton regardless of the nature of the merchandise or services its shops offer.
Flaw No. 2: In the Harmon area, the Law calls for new buildings to be “designed to enhance the district’s small-scale character.” But the character of the buildings in the vast urban renewal project and associated parking areas envisioned under the proposed zoning changes give the lie to the phrase “small scale.”
Flaw No. 3: The Law next mandates a very questionable scheme. Here’s what it proposes for Harmon: “To reinforce the area’s role as a gateway, the Planning Board shall encourage the design and placement of a distinctive gateway feature such as a clock or sculpture near the corner of Croton Point Avenue and South Riverside Avenue.” Erecting a clock or a sculpture approved by the Planning Board with an incoming business footing the bill? I’m not making any of this up. It’s right there in the Law at 230-20.6-4
Because the avowed function of gateways is to give visitors “a sense of arrival,” why not a small Statue of Liberty with a variation on the Emma Lazarus sentiment carved into the base? “Give me your energized, your wealthy, your eager customers yearning to spend freely.” In other gateway areas, how about an impressive fountain, heroic statue or perhaps a miniature Arc de Triomphe? The sky’s the limit in beautifying Croton for new arrivals.
Flaw No. 4: In the Municipal Place area, the Law stresses the need for increased pedestrian facilities such as sidewalks, despite the fact that the layout and facilities of the area encourage and favor automobile usage. Pedestrian traffic is non-existent here, and it is still worth your life to try to cross Maple Street to get from one part of this gateway area to another on foot.
Flaw No. 5 is the designation of the North End area as a commercial gateway. In this area, a veritable Siberia for commercial development with no access from the Expressway, the Law is ultra-specific about prettification: “New development, landscaping and streetscaping shall be designed to preserve the district’s residential and rural feel from the village boundary line to Warren Road.”
The Law calls for sidewalks to be constructed on Warren Road from the village line south to Warren Road and west to the bridge over the Expressway. Preferential consideration is also given to site plans featuring “stone walls consistent with existing built walls along property lines to screen parking.” Street trees and shrubs should be planted on the east side of Route 9 and the west side of 9A (both are State roads and the designated roadsides are now heavily wooded) “to form a buffer between these roads and the North End gateway properties.”
In the course of human events, the power to write legislation controlling zoning in their immediate neighborhoods is not given to ordinary citizens. Section 20-3-E of the Village Code of Ethics calls for disclosure by public officials of any interest in legislation. It so happens that among the driving forces behind the passage in 2004 of the Gateway Law was an appointed Village official living on Briggs Lane off Warren Road, immediately adjacent to the North End gateway area. Because there was no disclosure, disqualification or recusal, it would seem that “somebody’s gotta lot of splainin’ to do.”
Continuing a detailed study of the flawed Gateway Law to which zoning changes will be added, here are a few of the Law’s flaws that professional planners have already bestowed on us: (References to the Gateway Law hereafter will be to “the Law.”)
Flaw No. 1 is in the fallacious concept that if we “upgrade the image and strengthen the visual identity of the Village,” visitors will automatically come to Croton regardless of the nature of the merchandise or services its shops offer.
Flaw No. 2: In the Harmon area, the Law calls for new buildings to be “designed to enhance the district’s small-scale character.” But the character of the buildings in the vast urban renewal project and associated parking areas envisioned under the proposed zoning changes give the lie to the phrase “small scale.”
Flaw No. 3: The Law next mandates a very questionable scheme. Here’s what it proposes for Harmon: “To reinforce the area’s role as a gateway, the Planning Board shall encourage the design and placement of a distinctive gateway feature such as a clock or sculpture near the corner of Croton Point Avenue and South Riverside Avenue.” Erecting a clock or a sculpture approved by the Planning Board with an incoming business footing the bill? I’m not making any of this up. It’s right there in the Law at 230-20.6-4
Because the avowed function of gateways is to give visitors “a sense of arrival,” why not a small Statue of Liberty with a variation on the Emma Lazarus sentiment carved into the base? “Give me your energized, your wealthy, your eager customers yearning to spend freely.” In other gateway areas, how about an impressive fountain, heroic statue or perhaps a miniature Arc de Triomphe? The sky’s the limit in beautifying Croton for new arrivals.
Flaw No. 4: In the Municipal Place area, the Law stresses the need for increased pedestrian facilities such as sidewalks, despite the fact that the layout and facilities of the area encourage and favor automobile usage. Pedestrian traffic is non-existent here, and it is still worth your life to try to cross Maple Street to get from one part of this gateway area to another on foot.
Flaw No. 5 is the designation of the North End area as a commercial gateway. In this area, a veritable Siberia for commercial development with no access from the Expressway, the Law is ultra-specific about prettification: “New development, landscaping and streetscaping shall be designed to preserve the district’s residential and rural feel from the village boundary line to Warren Road.”
The Law calls for sidewalks to be constructed on Warren Road from the village line south to Warren Road and west to the bridge over the Expressway. Preferential consideration is also given to site plans featuring “stone walls consistent with existing built walls along property lines to screen parking.” Street trees and shrubs should be planted on the east side of Route 9 and the west side of 9A (both are State roads and the designated roadsides are now heavily wooded) “to form a buffer between these roads and the North End gateway properties.”
In the course of human events, the power to write legislation controlling zoning in their immediate neighborhoods is not given to ordinary citizens. Section 20-3-E of the Village Code of Ethics calls for disclosure by public officials of any interest in legislation. It so happens that among the driving forces behind the passage in 2004 of the Gateway Law was an appointed Village official living on Briggs Lane off Warren Road, immediately adjacent to the North End gateway area. Because there was no disclosure, disqualification or recusal, it would seem that “somebody’s gotta lot of splainin’ to do.”
Thursday, July 30, 2009
When Government Works Against a Community's Best Interests
OP ED
Governments often work in ways contrary to the interests of those who elected them and whom they profess to serve. Croton is an example of this. With local retail businesses struggling to survive, Croton’s government recently waived permit requirements for itself and cut a rent-free deal with a for-profit corporation. By installing a so-called “farmer’s market” on public property and providing village traffic control personnel without so much as a public hearing, Croton facilitated competition with local food businesses, making their survival more unlikely. All the while it sheds crocodile tears over the sad state of retail business in Croton.
The controversial Harmon plan is another glaring example. It proposes to make substantial changes in the flawed Gateway Law, a poor foundation on which to construct anything. A small army of critics is attacking these changes that will affect all Croton neighborhoods. I am one of them. The Gateway Law mandates that new development in the Harmon area be designed “to enhance the district’s small-scale character.” Yet an examination of the plan for Harmon proposed by the committee’s consultant reveals a gross departure from those guidelines.
For the three lots described as the Dodge property, the plan shows a building containing 24,800 square feet of total floor area. Such a building would enclose 289,325 cubic feet of space. By any standard, that’s one helluva bulky building. Behind this massive structure will be an equally large parking lot, illuminated at night, containing 47 parking spaces to serve 16 retail or professional units and some 40 residential units. Despite its enormous capacity, 47 spaces are admittedly inadequate for the building’s needs. The consultant’s solution is for parking spaces to be shared by residents and outsiders in what can best be described as an intricate game of musical chairs played with automobiles.
Unfortunately, too, the Harmon committee neglected to point out to the consultant that the corner lot was a site of historical significance—namely, Harmon’s first and oldest building, the original sales office of Clifford B. Harmon. Their totally unacceptable plan calls for its destruction.
I am a firm believer in the natural superiority of women. Studies have shown that women excel in a wide variety of areas: intelligence, physical and emotional health, sensory perception, sociability, and longevity, to name a few. As caregivers women are unsurpassed. I showed the consultant’s layout to my wife, Edith. It took her about three minutes of study to detect the fundamental flaw in the plan. “Where’s the open space? Where will the kids who will live in these apartments play?’ she asked. “Will their mothers caution them, ‘Go outside and play—but watch out for traffic. And don’t play in the parking lot. It’s dangerous with all those cars backing up.’?” The nearest of Croton’s too-few playgrounds is almost a mile away, my wife pointed out.
In the 1930s many small retailers got their start by “living over the store.” This gave them reasonable rent and a way to work long hours in the family delicatessen at street level. The Harmon plan is a bastardization of that concept. Croton’s planners seem bent on creating a veritable rabbit warren of retail stores, professional offices and barely habitable attic apartments. By injecting a large number of transient renters into a suburban commercial neighborhood, they will re-create an overcrowded urban landscape—the very conditions many Croton homeowners fled the city to escape.
Opponents of the Harmon plan have taken to calling the eventual result a “housing project,” an appellation that upsets proponents. I prefer to describe it as a “visual blight certain to be sparsely tenanted and a totally unacceptable slum.”
Governments often work in ways contrary to the interests of those who elected them and whom they profess to serve. Croton is an example of this. With local retail businesses struggling to survive, Croton’s government recently waived permit requirements for itself and cut a rent-free deal with a for-profit corporation. By installing a so-called “farmer’s market” on public property and providing village traffic control personnel without so much as a public hearing, Croton facilitated competition with local food businesses, making their survival more unlikely. All the while it sheds crocodile tears over the sad state of retail business in Croton.
The controversial Harmon plan is another glaring example. It proposes to make substantial changes in the flawed Gateway Law, a poor foundation on which to construct anything. A small army of critics is attacking these changes that will affect all Croton neighborhoods. I am one of them. The Gateway Law mandates that new development in the Harmon area be designed “to enhance the district’s small-scale character.” Yet an examination of the plan for Harmon proposed by the committee’s consultant reveals a gross departure from those guidelines.
For the three lots described as the Dodge property, the plan shows a building containing 24,800 square feet of total floor area. Such a building would enclose 289,325 cubic feet of space. By any standard, that’s one helluva bulky building. Behind this massive structure will be an equally large parking lot, illuminated at night, containing 47 parking spaces to serve 16 retail or professional units and some 40 residential units. Despite its enormous capacity, 47 spaces are admittedly inadequate for the building’s needs. The consultant’s solution is for parking spaces to be shared by residents and outsiders in what can best be described as an intricate game of musical chairs played with automobiles.
Unfortunately, too, the Harmon committee neglected to point out to the consultant that the corner lot was a site of historical significance—namely, Harmon’s first and oldest building, the original sales office of Clifford B. Harmon. Their totally unacceptable plan calls for its destruction.
I am a firm believer in the natural superiority of women. Studies have shown that women excel in a wide variety of areas: intelligence, physical and emotional health, sensory perception, sociability, and longevity, to name a few. As caregivers women are unsurpassed. I showed the consultant’s layout to my wife, Edith. It took her about three minutes of study to detect the fundamental flaw in the plan. “Where’s the open space? Where will the kids who will live in these apartments play?’ she asked. “Will their mothers caution them, ‘Go outside and play—but watch out for traffic. And don’t play in the parking lot. It’s dangerous with all those cars backing up.’?” The nearest of Croton’s too-few playgrounds is almost a mile away, my wife pointed out.
In the 1930s many small retailers got their start by “living over the store.” This gave them reasonable rent and a way to work long hours in the family delicatessen at street level. The Harmon plan is a bastardization of that concept. Croton’s planners seem bent on creating a veritable rabbit warren of retail stores, professional offices and barely habitable attic apartments. By injecting a large number of transient renters into a suburban commercial neighborhood, they will re-create an overcrowded urban landscape—the very conditions many Croton homeowners fled the city to escape.
Opponents of the Harmon plan have taken to calling the eventual result a “housing project,” an appellation that upsets proponents. I prefer to describe it as a “visual blight certain to be sparsely tenanted and a totally unacceptable slum.”
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Bookstore No Cure for What Ails Croton
OP ED
Why are would-be planners with no grasp of reality or commerce so quick to prescribe ways to get Harmon’s business district to pull up its socks when all retail areas in Croton are facing problems? Among other suggestions to remedy Croton’s deep-seated woes, we are told, “What this village needs is a bookstore in Harmon.” Perhaps the members of the Harmon Committee will chip in the half-million to a million dollars and the business acumen such a venture would require.
Independent booksellers are a dying breed whose numbers continue to diminish. It is impossible for independent booksellers to match the buying power and low prices of the megachain bookstores, discounters like Walmart or Sam’s Club, and Amazon.com. A comparatively small number of independents have survived by adding extra services. These include gift items, used books, magazines, comfortable tub chairs, piped-in music, wi-fi access, and an adjunct café selling food, latte or wine and beer. A few newcomers have gained a foothold by specializing in narrow fields, such as crime and mystery.
Every successful bookstore needs employees who are readers and who know and love the product they are selling. Today the bookstore is not only a place to buy books. It has become a place to relax and talk about them. Allow me to deflate the bookstore myth once and for all with facts and statistics:
A recent survey revealed that 27 percent of American adults admitted they had not read a single book for pleasure in the past year. Although it represented a 3.2% decline, an astronomical 275,232 individual new titles were published in 2008. That’s 5,293 new titles every week. Imagine being a bookseller and trying to keep up with that flood of books.
The average new book has a shelf life somewhere between milk and yogurt. Unlike any other article of commerce, books are sold to booksellers with generous return privileges. After a fixed period, booksellers can return unsold books for full credit.
About 40 percent of new books—largely unsold bestsellers—are returned to publishers. Eventually, many of these are shredded and shipped to China on empty container ships. Not to worry. They will come back as recycled cardboard packaging for products formerly made by American workers.
Instituted during the Great Depression to encourage dealers to stock books, the indefensible practice of printing excessive quantities and then accepting returns is sheer madness, making book publishing one of the biggest wasters of energy and resources. Except for smaller press runs of books printed for libraries and academic use, the future of books seems destined to lie with electronic books and “print-on-demand” versions.
For some, myself included, books are almost like air, water and food—essential to life. But I am neither overly sanguine nor foolish enough to think that Croton, now a backwater community bypassed by the limited-access Expressway and offering a narrow customer base of less than 8,000 souls, is an appropriate location for an independent bookstore. A village in crisis can hardly take seriously such desperate clutching at straws.
Why are would-be planners with no grasp of reality or commerce so quick to prescribe ways to get Harmon’s business district to pull up its socks when all retail areas in Croton are facing problems? Among other suggestions to remedy Croton’s deep-seated woes, we are told, “What this village needs is a bookstore in Harmon.” Perhaps the members of the Harmon Committee will chip in the half-million to a million dollars and the business acumen such a venture would require.
Independent booksellers are a dying breed whose numbers continue to diminish. It is impossible for independent booksellers to match the buying power and low prices of the megachain bookstores, discounters like Walmart or Sam’s Club, and Amazon.com. A comparatively small number of independents have survived by adding extra services. These include gift items, used books, magazines, comfortable tub chairs, piped-in music, wi-fi access, and an adjunct café selling food, latte or wine and beer. A few newcomers have gained a foothold by specializing in narrow fields, such as crime and mystery.
Every successful bookstore needs employees who are readers and who know and love the product they are selling. Today the bookstore is not only a place to buy books. It has become a place to relax and talk about them. Allow me to deflate the bookstore myth once and for all with facts and statistics:
A recent survey revealed that 27 percent of American adults admitted they had not read a single book for pleasure in the past year. Although it represented a 3.2% decline, an astronomical 275,232 individual new titles were published in 2008. That’s 5,293 new titles every week. Imagine being a bookseller and trying to keep up with that flood of books.
The average new book has a shelf life somewhere between milk and yogurt. Unlike any other article of commerce, books are sold to booksellers with generous return privileges. After a fixed period, booksellers can return unsold books for full credit.
About 40 percent of new books—largely unsold bestsellers—are returned to publishers. Eventually, many of these are shredded and shipped to China on empty container ships. Not to worry. They will come back as recycled cardboard packaging for products formerly made by American workers.
Instituted during the Great Depression to encourage dealers to stock books, the indefensible practice of printing excessive quantities and then accepting returns is sheer madness, making book publishing one of the biggest wasters of energy and resources. Except for smaller press runs of books printed for libraries and academic use, the future of books seems destined to lie with electronic books and “print-on-demand” versions.
For some, myself included, books are almost like air, water and food—essential to life. But I am neither overly sanguine nor foolish enough to think that Croton, now a backwater community bypassed by the limited-access Expressway and offering a narrow customer base of less than 8,000 souls, is an appropriate location for an independent bookstore. A village in crisis can hardly take seriously such desperate clutching at straws.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
What's Wrong with the Harmon Plan?
OP ED
Can a community be subjected to too much planning? “You betcha,” as soon-to-be ex-Governor of Alaska Sarah Palin would say in her folksy style. The poor woman is a prime example of the too much, too soon syndrome.
The Harmon Plan Made Simple
Croton residents are collectively being urged to buy a pig in a poke. The current proposal involves making changes in the 2004 Gateway Law, now part of the Zoning Code. But the gateway concept is based on the erroneous principle that Croton should be made attractive—not to Crotonites—but to visitors presumably coming here to shop. This law defines a gateway as “the roads and surrounding properties a motorist or pedestrian encounters when first entering the Village. These areas create a sense of arrival and connection to the Village, and establish an image and initial impression of the community.”
Had researchers with clipboards been positioned at two exits from the Expressway for a single day to question arriving motorists about their destinations, the fallacy of that premise would have been revealed. Aside from those going directly to ShopRite from the Expressway’s Croton Point Avenue exit, few are headed to local shops or businesses. Most drivers entering Croton are either residents or are transients headed to Yorktown and points east.
The Gateway Law is straight out of Alice in Wonderland. Pretending to attract business, it declares various legitimate and socially acceptable enterprises, including automobile dealerships and fast-food restaurants, to be illegal. In its five years on the books, this law has not brought a single new business to Croton. Among the law’s other unreasonable anti-business provisions is its mindless ban on drive-through windows. Studies show that these can actually reduce the need for parking spaces.
One wonders how Croton can ban fast-food establishments with a straight face when it has pizza parlors up the kazoo. Gateway Law framers freely acknowledge that the law was directed against national food chains. Yet we have a Dunkin Donuts and a Subway sandwich shop. The ban on fast food restaurants has been an empty deterrent.
Ever since the Expressway opened in 1967, Croton has been a backwater community cut off from the traffic stream. Although most residents welcomed the change, isolation comes at a price. Because of its isolation and small customer base, Croton is a poor prospect for capital investment in retail space—a reality that will haunt any Harmon redevelopment. The only way to bring about change is to ask NY State to re-route traffic through Croton as before. Fat chance.
Consultants
Croton also has a penchant for hiring consultants to support local planners’ shaky concepts. Such experts always lack any sense of the history and continuity of the village. A case in point is the contractor, Danth, Inc. On the basis of two brief visits, its report lists the ideal types of “niche” businesses Croton should target: “a cell phone store, a pet shop, stores offering knitting, women’s clothing, prepared meals, and full- and limited-service restaurants.” Unfortunately, every one of these businesses has been tried here and either failed or closed. The consultant obviously never bothered to read Croton’s zoning code. Its report, which can be read on the Village’s website, offers suggestions about the best locations in Croton for national chain fast-food restaurants! For these examples of the fallibility of advice from quickie consultants unfamiliar with Croton, the Village paid out $15,000 of our tax dollars.
That “eyesore.” The Dodge dealership has been a thriving fixture in Croton since the 1920s. With its punitive prohibition against automobile dealerships, the Gateway Law drastically diminished to zerothe value of the business and the owner’s ability to sell it . Understandably, the owner did what any sensible businessperson would do. He closed the dealership, leaving the buildings empty—but still paying taxes.
Elsewhere in the Hudson Valley, new uses are regularly found for existing empty commercial buildings—but not in Croton. Proponents of the Harmon Plan now call the empty dealership an eyesore and the rest of the Harmon shopping area “blighted.” Having caused a viable business to close, they now clamor for the removal of the eyesore they themselves created. This reminds me of the teenager who murdered his parents and then begged the judge for leniency because he was an orphan.
Reminiscent of the recent real estate bubble, extravagant pie-in-the-sky promises are being voiced about the Harmon Plan. Beautification of the Harmon shopping area will create Harmon’s new “downtown” and attract throngs of strolling shoppers. Proponents seem unaware that Harmon’s future Times Square already has three very permanent and necessary gasoline stations and an automobile repair shop along its main drag.
It’s My Harmon, Too.
My family and I were not looking for a picture-postcard New England village when we went house hunting here in 1963. We moved to the Harmon area of Croton because it was what it was: an unpretentious workaday post-industrial Hudson River village with a good school system and frequent train service to the city. Because Clifford Harmon was a seller of building lots rather than a builder of houses, Harmon today is no Levittown, but a delightful mix of architectural styles from modest bungalows to more imposing residences. Its shopping areas can best be described as quirky or quaint—but appropriate to the history and character of the village. Most residents like it that way.
The Harmon redevelopment concept proposes to take the tax burden off the backs of Croton’s home owners with a Rube Goldberg scheme: (1) Raise the number of permitted floors in retail buildings to three and astronomically increase the number of walk-up apartments. Add a parking scheme resembling the game of musical chairs. (2) Wait for developers to flock to Croton and (3) buy, (4) demolish and (5) replace perfectly good buildings (including a landmark). Croton will then (6) undertake to find retail tenants, and (7) soak the hell out of them with high taxes, as promised by Trustee Olver in his patronizing letter to The Gazette.
If you believe this unrealistic, self-delusional plan has a chance of succeeding, especially in today’s troubled economy, I’ve got a dam I’d like to sell you.
Can a community be subjected to too much planning? “You betcha,” as soon-to-be ex-Governor of Alaska Sarah Palin would say in her folksy style. The poor woman is a prime example of the too much, too soon syndrome.
The Harmon Plan Made Simple
Croton residents are collectively being urged to buy a pig in a poke. The current proposal involves making changes in the 2004 Gateway Law, now part of the Zoning Code. But the gateway concept is based on the erroneous principle that Croton should be made attractive—not to Crotonites—but to visitors presumably coming here to shop. This law defines a gateway as “the roads and surrounding properties a motorist or pedestrian encounters when first entering the Village. These areas create a sense of arrival and connection to the Village, and establish an image and initial impression of the community.”
Had researchers with clipboards been positioned at two exits from the Expressway for a single day to question arriving motorists about their destinations, the fallacy of that premise would have been revealed. Aside from those going directly to ShopRite from the Expressway’s Croton Point Avenue exit, few are headed to local shops or businesses. Most drivers entering Croton are either residents or are transients headed to Yorktown and points east.
The Gateway Law is straight out of Alice in Wonderland. Pretending to attract business, it declares various legitimate and socially acceptable enterprises, including automobile dealerships and fast-food restaurants, to be illegal. In its five years on the books, this law has not brought a single new business to Croton. Among the law’s other unreasonable anti-business provisions is its mindless ban on drive-through windows. Studies show that these can actually reduce the need for parking spaces.
One wonders how Croton can ban fast-food establishments with a straight face when it has pizza parlors up the kazoo. Gateway Law framers freely acknowledge that the law was directed against national food chains. Yet we have a Dunkin Donuts and a Subway sandwich shop. The ban on fast food restaurants has been an empty deterrent.
Ever since the Expressway opened in 1967, Croton has been a backwater community cut off from the traffic stream. Although most residents welcomed the change, isolation comes at a price. Because of its isolation and small customer base, Croton is a poor prospect for capital investment in retail space—a reality that will haunt any Harmon redevelopment. The only way to bring about change is to ask NY State to re-route traffic through Croton as before. Fat chance.
Consultants
Croton also has a penchant for hiring consultants to support local planners’ shaky concepts. Such experts always lack any sense of the history and continuity of the village. A case in point is the contractor, Danth, Inc. On the basis of two brief visits, its report lists the ideal types of “niche” businesses Croton should target: “a cell phone store, a pet shop, stores offering knitting, women’s clothing, prepared meals, and full- and limited-service restaurants.” Unfortunately, every one of these businesses has been tried here and either failed or closed. The consultant obviously never bothered to read Croton’s zoning code. Its report, which can be read on the Village’s website, offers suggestions about the best locations in Croton for national chain fast-food restaurants! For these examples of the fallibility of advice from quickie consultants unfamiliar with Croton, the Village paid out $15,000 of our tax dollars.
That “eyesore.” The Dodge dealership has been a thriving fixture in Croton since the 1920s. With its punitive prohibition against automobile dealerships, the Gateway Law drastically diminished to zerothe value of the business and the owner’s ability to sell it . Understandably, the owner did what any sensible businessperson would do. He closed the dealership, leaving the buildings empty—but still paying taxes.
Elsewhere in the Hudson Valley, new uses are regularly found for existing empty commercial buildings—but not in Croton. Proponents of the Harmon Plan now call the empty dealership an eyesore and the rest of the Harmon shopping area “blighted.” Having caused a viable business to close, they now clamor for the removal of the eyesore they themselves created. This reminds me of the teenager who murdered his parents and then begged the judge for leniency because he was an orphan.
Reminiscent of the recent real estate bubble, extravagant pie-in-the-sky promises are being voiced about the Harmon Plan. Beautification of the Harmon shopping area will create Harmon’s new “downtown” and attract throngs of strolling shoppers. Proponents seem unaware that Harmon’s future Times Square already has three very permanent and necessary gasoline stations and an automobile repair shop along its main drag.
It’s My Harmon, Too.
My family and I were not looking for a picture-postcard New England village when we went house hunting here in 1963. We moved to the Harmon area of Croton because it was what it was: an unpretentious workaday post-industrial Hudson River village with a good school system and frequent train service to the city. Because Clifford Harmon was a seller of building lots rather than a builder of houses, Harmon today is no Levittown, but a delightful mix of architectural styles from modest bungalows to more imposing residences. Its shopping areas can best be described as quirky or quaint—but appropriate to the history and character of the village. Most residents like it that way.
The Harmon redevelopment concept proposes to take the tax burden off the backs of Croton’s home owners with a Rube Goldberg scheme: (1) Raise the number of permitted floors in retail buildings to three and astronomically increase the number of walk-up apartments. Add a parking scheme resembling the game of musical chairs. (2) Wait for developers to flock to Croton and (3) buy, (4) demolish and (5) replace perfectly good buildings (including a landmark). Croton will then (6) undertake to find retail tenants, and (7) soak the hell out of them with high taxes, as promised by Trustee Olver in his patronizing letter to The Gazette.
If you believe this unrealistic, self-delusional plan has a chance of succeeding, especially in today’s troubled economy, I’ve got a dam I’d like to sell you.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Croton's Litany of Economic Body Blows
OP ED
Proponents of the so-called Harmon Plan are touting the revitalization of the Harmon business district as the way to get Croton out of its economic doldrums. My primary problem with this scheme is that it is spot zoning, a practice specifically forbidden by law. As usual, when differences arise about planning in Croton, ignorance of the facts rules the day. What proponents lack are a grasp of history and knowledge of current conditions.
A single cohesive shopping district along a main thoroughfare characterizes most Hudson River villages. Not so in Croton, which has five separate and distinct shopping areas, or “nodes.” These are listed here in their historical sequence: (1) Riverside Avenue (the remains of the former Lower Village), (2) Grand Street (the Upper Village), (3) Harmon, (4) Van Wyck, Croton Commons and the lower end of Route 129, (5) ShopRite Plaza and environs. Next, consider the doleful economic impact on Croton of the following events.
1923: Westchester acquires Croton Point, converts it into a park and takes its 508 acres off Croton’s tax rolls. No other village has so much public space within its borders yielding no tax revenue.
1950s to 1960s: The heart of Croton is devastated by the successive construction of three large shopping centers and their unsightly giant parking lots that should have been located at the periphery of the village. Croton added to its automobile blight by creating and paving a gigantic station parking lot capable of holding almost 2,000 vehicles—a veritable sea of parked cars stretching as far as the eye can see. These are self-inflicted wounds that beautification of other commercial areas today can never offset.
1967: The 12.9-mile long Croton Expressway opens, the only completed portion of a limited-access superhighway intended to link the Thruway at Tarrytown with Route I-84 at Beacon. Croton is thus effectively by-passed by north-south automobile traffic. Construction of the Expressway also destroys a thriving commercial area in Croton called the Lower Village.
1970: The Penn-Central Railroad declares bankruptcy on June 21, depriving Croton of its largest taxpayer and the revenue from its more than 100 acres of rail yards, shops and station.
2004: Croton enacts the calamitous Gateway Law. Not only does it specifically prohibit certain kinds of businesses, it imposes a totally impractical floor-area ratio on new construction. In five years, not a single enterprise that would be subject to the 2004 law has come to Croton. For 42 years some 40,000 motorists each day have sped past Croton on the Expressway. The most successful businesses in Croton have all been those largely able to subsist on the patronage of Crotonites.
No other village in the Hudson Valley has been subjected to such a chain of massive economic setbacks. Yet, ignoring the above realities, proponents of the Harmon Plan see adding modern retail storefronts as a magical solution to what they describe as Harmon’s image problems. They claim that such changes will result in additional foot traffic and yield higher tax revenues.
The plan also blithely doubles the apartment space permitted over stores, improbably describing potential tenants as “city dwellers who want to dip their toes in country living.” It also proposes to overcome the extreme shortage of parking space in Harmon with an impractical shared-parking concept.
Croton still lacks a business-development agency to encourage new business. It has no inventory of commercial properties in the village, and no idea of their dimensions, amenities or current rents. How can any development plans be contemplated when we have no idea of Croton’s business picture today? It may very well be that Croton should be reducing commercially zoned areas instead of expanding them.
One of the objectives of the Harmon Plan committee has been to save face for those responsible for the Gateway Law by quietly changing the floor-area ratio to a realistic number. I challenge them to come forward and acknowledge publicly that the floor-area ratio fixed in 2004 was wildly aberrant for Croton’s commercial properties.
Proponents of the so-called Harmon Plan are touting the revitalization of the Harmon business district as the way to get Croton out of its economic doldrums. My primary problem with this scheme is that it is spot zoning, a practice specifically forbidden by law. As usual, when differences arise about planning in Croton, ignorance of the facts rules the day. What proponents lack are a grasp of history and knowledge of current conditions.
A single cohesive shopping district along a main thoroughfare characterizes most Hudson River villages. Not so in Croton, which has five separate and distinct shopping areas, or “nodes.” These are listed here in their historical sequence: (1) Riverside Avenue (the remains of the former Lower Village), (2) Grand Street (the Upper Village), (3) Harmon, (4) Van Wyck, Croton Commons and the lower end of Route 129, (5) ShopRite Plaza and environs. Next, consider the doleful economic impact on Croton of the following events.
1923: Westchester acquires Croton Point, converts it into a park and takes its 508 acres off Croton’s tax rolls. No other village has so much public space within its borders yielding no tax revenue.
1950s to 1960s: The heart of Croton is devastated by the successive construction of three large shopping centers and their unsightly giant parking lots that should have been located at the periphery of the village. Croton added to its automobile blight by creating and paving a gigantic station parking lot capable of holding almost 2,000 vehicles—a veritable sea of parked cars stretching as far as the eye can see. These are self-inflicted wounds that beautification of other commercial areas today can never offset.
1967: The 12.9-mile long Croton Expressway opens, the only completed portion of a limited-access superhighway intended to link the Thruway at Tarrytown with Route I-84 at Beacon. Croton is thus effectively by-passed by north-south automobile traffic. Construction of the Expressway also destroys a thriving commercial area in Croton called the Lower Village.
1970: The Penn-Central Railroad declares bankruptcy on June 21, depriving Croton of its largest taxpayer and the revenue from its more than 100 acres of rail yards, shops and station.
2004: Croton enacts the calamitous Gateway Law. Not only does it specifically prohibit certain kinds of businesses, it imposes a totally impractical floor-area ratio on new construction. In five years, not a single enterprise that would be subject to the 2004 law has come to Croton. For 42 years some 40,000 motorists each day have sped past Croton on the Expressway. The most successful businesses in Croton have all been those largely able to subsist on the patronage of Crotonites.
No other village in the Hudson Valley has been subjected to such a chain of massive economic setbacks. Yet, ignoring the above realities, proponents of the Harmon Plan see adding modern retail storefronts as a magical solution to what they describe as Harmon’s image problems. They claim that such changes will result in additional foot traffic and yield higher tax revenues.
The plan also blithely doubles the apartment space permitted over stores, improbably describing potential tenants as “city dwellers who want to dip their toes in country living.” It also proposes to overcome the extreme shortage of parking space in Harmon with an impractical shared-parking concept.
Croton still lacks a business-development agency to encourage new business. It has no inventory of commercial properties in the village, and no idea of their dimensions, amenities or current rents. How can any development plans be contemplated when we have no idea of Croton’s business picture today? It may very well be that Croton should be reducing commercially zoned areas instead of expanding them.
One of the objectives of the Harmon Plan committee has been to save face for those responsible for the Gateway Law by quietly changing the floor-area ratio to a realistic number. I challenge them to come forward and acknowledge publicly that the floor-area ratio fixed in 2004 was wildly aberrant for Croton’s commercial properties.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Backing Into Zoning Change 12
PLANNING
Projections of Croton’s growth abound. But has anyone looked at Croton’s population statistics over the past century? I was trained as a scientist. The first rule in science is to gather data so as to be able to deduce theories, reproduce the results of others or draw conclusions.
For the record, therefore, and for use by those who value and use statistics, I offer the following table. All figures, except for one instance that is noted, are verified population figures from the pertinent decennial U.S. Census. The drop down to single-digit percentage growth since 1970 may indicate that Croton is approaching population saturation, at least for a while. It will be interesting to see what next year’s 2010 census holds for Croton.
1900: 1,533
1907: First lots sold in Harmon
1910: 1,806 (+273 = +17.8% )
1917-18: U.S in World War I
1920: 2,286 (+480 = +26.6%)
1930: 2,447 (+161 = +7.0%)
1932: Harmon, Mt. Airy absorbed by Croton
1940: 3,843 (+1,396 = +57.0%) (See Note 1)
1941-45: U.S. in World War II
1950: 4,837 (+994 = +25.9%)
1960: 6,812 (+1,975 = +40.8%)
1970: 7,523 (+711 = +10.4%) (See comment below)
1980: 6,889 (-634 = -8.1%)
1990: 7,018 (+129 = +2.9%)
2000: 7,606 (+588 = +8.4%)
2008: 7,919 (+313 = +4.1%) (See Note 2)
--------------------------------------
Note 1: The figure of 1,396 includes population growth in Croton, and the added population contributed by Harmon and Mt. Airy.
Note 2: July 2008 estimate. Source: city-data.com
The 1970 figure appears to be anomalous. No one in authority can explain the rise to a total population that would not be approached again for three decades. The drop off in the 1980 census is also puzzling, resulting in a net gain in population between 1960 and 1980 of only 77 persons, or one percent.. The consensus is that these widely swinging numbers represent changes in the designated election districts used to delimit the boundaries of Croton-on-Hudson for census purposes.
Projections of Croton’s growth abound. But has anyone looked at Croton’s population statistics over the past century? I was trained as a scientist. The first rule in science is to gather data so as to be able to deduce theories, reproduce the results of others or draw conclusions.
For the record, therefore, and for use by those who value and use statistics, I offer the following table. All figures, except for one instance that is noted, are verified population figures from the pertinent decennial U.S. Census. The drop down to single-digit percentage growth since 1970 may indicate that Croton is approaching population saturation, at least for a while. It will be interesting to see what next year’s 2010 census holds for Croton.
Croton-on-Hudson Population Statistics and Growth
1898: Croton-on-Hudson incorporates1900: 1,533
1907: First lots sold in Harmon
1910: 1,806 (+273 = +17.8% )
1917-18: U.S in World War I
1920: 2,286 (+480 = +26.6%)
1930: 2,447 (+161 = +7.0%)
1932: Harmon, Mt. Airy absorbed by Croton
1940: 3,843 (+1,396 = +57.0%) (See Note 1)
1941-45: U.S. in World War II
1950: 4,837 (+994 = +25.9%)
1960: 6,812 (+1,975 = +40.8%)
1970: 7,523 (+711 = +10.4%) (See comment below)
1980: 6,889 (-634 = -8.1%)
1990: 7,018 (+129 = +2.9%)
2000: 7,606 (+588 = +8.4%)
2008: 7,919 (+313 = +4.1%) (See Note 2)
--------------------------------------
Note 1: The figure of 1,396 includes population growth in Croton, and the added population contributed by Harmon and Mt. Airy.
Note 2: July 2008 estimate. Source: city-data.com
The 1970 figure appears to be anomalous. No one in authority can explain the rise to a total population that would not be approached again for three decades. The drop off in the 1980 census is also puzzling, resulting in a net gain in population between 1960 and 1980 of only 77 persons, or one percent.. The consensus is that these widely swinging numbers represent changes in the designated election districts used to delimit the boundaries of Croton-on-Hudson for census purposes.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Backing Into Zoning Change 11
PLANNING
What Did Croton Taxpayers Get for Their $21,500? That was the amount spent on two Harmon reports? The answer is, “Not much.” $6,500 of it went to Saccardi & Schiff for a plan that includes the destruction of the oldest building in Harmon and for a controversial scheme for residents and customers to play musical chairs with parking behind a huge, blocky building that would replace the Village-created “eyesore” of the Dodge dealership.
Don’t let the Harmon committee tell you that this large building of nearly 25,000 square feet and its 47 parking spaces are only "suggestions" for what could occupy that space. Their intention clearly is to demolish the landmark Clifford Harmon former sales office. In their exhaustive 44-page recommendations to the Village Board, the building is shown in Appendix 2 as an “affected property,” and is glaringly absent from plans 4c and 4d. Why doesn’t the Harmon committee fess up and admit they were not aware of the building’s history?
Another $15,000 went to Danth Inc. for a report that claims Harmon is ripe for a host of businesses, based on its “unmet demands.” Among these are stores selling furniture, family clothing, women’s clothing, radio-TV-electronics, jewelry, sporting goods, used-merchandise, and full- and limited-service eating places. The report then winnows these and recommends for Harmon a cell phone store, a pet shop, stores offering knitting, women’s clothing, prepared meals, and full- and limited-service restaurants. Whew!
The report’s author was obviously unfamiliar with the study area and its retailing history. He says the nearest pet shop to Harmon is in Montrose, 4.7 miles away. Montrose has no pet shop. Choice Pets in Ossining, 3 miles away, is the nearest pet shop. Knitting? The Niddy Noddy, even with world-famous knitter Irene Miller at the helm, had to close. Women’s clothing? Remember the Import Corner, a lovely store? Same fate.
The Harmon committee obviously neglected to provide the author of the report with a copy of the 2004 Gateway Law banning fast-food restaurants. How embarrassing! He recommends a McDonald’s for Harmon, but points out that they would probably want to be closer to the Expressway. Another example of that law excluding revenue-producing businesses. And, despite the awkward presence of two shuttered Harmon restaurants, his report sees great hope for full-service restaurants there. Tell that to the owners of the Riverside Café and Tutto Bene.
All in all, this report is a huge disappointment. One has to wonder whether the Harmon committee believes that Croton taxpayers got $21,500 worth of sage advice from these two flawed reports. Our feeling is that we were gypped.
What Did Croton Taxpayers Get for Their $21,500? That was the amount spent on two Harmon reports? The answer is, “Not much.” $6,500 of it went to Saccardi & Schiff for a plan that includes the destruction of the oldest building in Harmon and for a controversial scheme for residents and customers to play musical chairs with parking behind a huge, blocky building that would replace the Village-created “eyesore” of the Dodge dealership.
Don’t let the Harmon committee tell you that this large building of nearly 25,000 square feet and its 47 parking spaces are only "suggestions" for what could occupy that space. Their intention clearly is to demolish the landmark Clifford Harmon former sales office. In their exhaustive 44-page recommendations to the Village Board, the building is shown in Appendix 2 as an “affected property,” and is glaringly absent from plans 4c and 4d. Why doesn’t the Harmon committee fess up and admit they were not aware of the building’s history?
Another $15,000 went to Danth Inc. for a report that claims Harmon is ripe for a host of businesses, based on its “unmet demands.” Among these are stores selling furniture, family clothing, women’s clothing, radio-TV-electronics, jewelry, sporting goods, used-merchandise, and full- and limited-service eating places. The report then winnows these and recommends for Harmon a cell phone store, a pet shop, stores offering knitting, women’s clothing, prepared meals, and full- and limited-service restaurants. Whew!
The report’s author was obviously unfamiliar with the study area and its retailing history. He says the nearest pet shop to Harmon is in Montrose, 4.7 miles away. Montrose has no pet shop. Choice Pets in Ossining, 3 miles away, is the nearest pet shop. Knitting? The Niddy Noddy, even with world-famous knitter Irene Miller at the helm, had to close. Women’s clothing? Remember the Import Corner, a lovely store? Same fate.
The Harmon committee obviously neglected to provide the author of the report with a copy of the 2004 Gateway Law banning fast-food restaurants. How embarrassing! He recommends a McDonald’s for Harmon, but points out that they would probably want to be closer to the Expressway. Another example of that law excluding revenue-producing businesses. And, despite the awkward presence of two shuttered Harmon restaurants, his report sees great hope for full-service restaurants there. Tell that to the owners of the Riverside Café and Tutto Bene.
All in all, this report is a huge disappointment. One has to wonder whether the Harmon committee believes that Croton taxpayers got $21,500 worth of sage advice from these two flawed reports. Our feeling is that we were gypped.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Backing Into Zoning Change 10
PLANNING
Ten Hurdles the Harmon Proposal Cannot Overcome. A Checklist
1. The Expressway. This limited access 9.2-mile highway bypasses Croton, leaving it cut off from the main north-south flow of traffic. Croton has never been the same ever since it opened in 1967. Some 40,000 vehicles detour around Croton daily at 55 miles an hour or more. Croton’s customer base is thus essentially reduced mostly to Croton’s population, approximately 8,000 persons.
2. Five widely separated shopping areas. These have their roots in Croton’s history, as described in Nos. 4 and 5 of this series. The lack of a single, cohesive shopping area creates special problems of geographical separation for Croton that can never be overcome.
3. Higher taxes for owners, more than 50% of which are school taxes.
4. Higher rents for renters.
5. Lack of a “magnet.” A bank or post office draws shoppers to a shopping area. Croton Commons, ShopRite and Van Wyck all have this added benefit. Harmon does not.
6. Less-than-ample traffic. “Traffic” in this sense refers to traditional foot traffic. Strolling shoppers are important to the economic health of shopping neighborhoods. Only Grand Street has a semblance of foot traffic and leisurely shopping. Harmon has no foot traffic, in part because of the presence of three of Croton’s four gas stations. The Harmon proposal will not give Croton a “downtown,” as candidate Restuccia claimed.
7. Inadequate parking. Finding parking spaces in some Croton neighborhoods is always a problem, notably Harmon, the Lower Village and Grand Street. The Harmon plan anticipates multiple use of parking spaces by residents and shop customers, a solution fraught with problems.
8. Competition. The huge Town Center and Jefferson Valley Mall and the smaller Beach, Arcadian and Chilmark complexes continue to give all Croton merchants competition. Newer Harmon merchants without an established clientele would suffer more than long-established stores.
9. Low level of community loyalty. For years, the Leo family owned The Video Connection in Croton Commons. When the Blockbuster chain opened a store nearby, The Video Connection tried to hang on. Did Croton residents support the local, family-owned business? They did not. They flocked to Blockbuster. The Video Connection closed soon after. So much for community loyalty.
10. Overly ambitious zoning. Croton may currently have too large an area zoned for commercial use, resulting in more retail spaces than there are potential tenants to fill them. This is a topic Croton has never wanted to explore, but perhaps it should do so now before it considers adding a large number of additional commercial retail spaces than are needed by its comparatively small customer base.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Backing Into Zoning Change 9
PLANNING
Let’s pause and review: The mantra of the Harmon committee, most of whose members live in Harmon, is “Build it and they will come.” Opponents say it should be “Build it and they won’t come.” Proponents of the divisive Harmon proposal admit they’re greedy for the bigger tax revenues new properties will bring. Fearing a depression is coming, critics say the concept slights other struggling areas of Croton.
Moreover, they point out, every Harmon property, occupied or unoccupied, is still yielding tax revenue. The proposal focuses on the former Dodge and Nappy’s properties. It foresees a developer purchasing them, demolishing the buildings (including a Harmon landmark) and erecting mixed-occupancy structures with ground-floor stores and an indefinite number of apartments on two floors above.
The fly in the ointment is the existing zoning law that must be changed. Opponents of the plan, including this writer, have pointed out that such spot zoning is illegal in New York. Why is the Village getting into the real-estate business and accommodating developers anyway? The Harmon committee cannot guarantee that tenants will show up. One of its members, Jeremy Ezra, 31, currently employed by a New York City real estate firm specializing in large commercial properties, has offered to assist in finding tenants. What the owners of barely profitable businesses elsewhere in Croton will think of this one-sided favoritism to Harmon is anybody’s guess.
With the first phase of new buildings nearing completion, the committee predicts individual property owners will begin to erect matching structures. The scenario goes something like this: I am the debt-free owner of a thriving store on South Riverside Avenue in Harmon, and I live above my store. Succumbing to the committee’s hype, I scrounge for credit and contract for a new building. Next, I close the store, sell off inventory and fixtures at a loss, lay off my two employees, move my household furniture to a storage facility, and rent a furnished apartment.
Fast-forward to the time when the replacement building is ready. After being without income for almost a year. I move into a new upstairs apartment, restock the store and try to entice former customers to return. It’s not easy. Because of my heavy debt load, I must charge higher prices. Kicking myself for ending up with a struggling business, massive mortgage, two empty high-rent apartments above mine, staggeringly higher tax bills—and a view of the new empty stores and apartments of the bankrupt developer across the street.
I have just one question for the Harmon committee: What planet do you people come from?
Let’s pause and review: The mantra of the Harmon committee, most of whose members live in Harmon, is “Build it and they will come.” Opponents say it should be “Build it and they won’t come.” Proponents of the divisive Harmon proposal admit they’re greedy for the bigger tax revenues new properties will bring. Fearing a depression is coming, critics say the concept slights other struggling areas of Croton.
Moreover, they point out, every Harmon property, occupied or unoccupied, is still yielding tax revenue. The proposal focuses on the former Dodge and Nappy’s properties. It foresees a developer purchasing them, demolishing the buildings (including a Harmon landmark) and erecting mixed-occupancy structures with ground-floor stores and an indefinite number of apartments on two floors above.
The fly in the ointment is the existing zoning law that must be changed. Opponents of the plan, including this writer, have pointed out that such spot zoning is illegal in New York. Why is the Village getting into the real-estate business and accommodating developers anyway? The Harmon committee cannot guarantee that tenants will show up. One of its members, Jeremy Ezra, 31, currently employed by a New York City real estate firm specializing in large commercial properties, has offered to assist in finding tenants. What the owners of barely profitable businesses elsewhere in Croton will think of this one-sided favoritism to Harmon is anybody’s guess.
With the first phase of new buildings nearing completion, the committee predicts individual property owners will begin to erect matching structures. The scenario goes something like this: I am the debt-free owner of a thriving store on South Riverside Avenue in Harmon, and I live above my store. Succumbing to the committee’s hype, I scrounge for credit and contract for a new building. Next, I close the store, sell off inventory and fixtures at a loss, lay off my two employees, move my household furniture to a storage facility, and rent a furnished apartment.
Fast-forward to the time when the replacement building is ready. After being without income for almost a year. I move into a new upstairs apartment, restock the store and try to entice former customers to return. It’s not easy. Because of my heavy debt load, I must charge higher prices. Kicking myself for ending up with a struggling business, massive mortgage, two empty high-rent apartments above mine, staggeringly higher tax bills—and a view of the new empty stores and apartments of the bankrupt developer across the street.
I have just one question for the Harmon committee: What planet do you people come from?
Monday, February 16, 2009
Backing Into Zoning Change 8
PLANNING
In 2004 Croton declared war on business. Not all businesses, just businesses certain people arbitrarily decided they didn’t want here. The attack weapon was the Gateway Law. Zoning laws usually specify permitted businesses or occupations. Croton turned common practice upside down. It designated five categories of undesirable businesses that any community wanting tax revenue would have gladly welcomed. Croton’s message: “Keep out!”
This 2004 law’s ban on parking lots was probably intended to prevent competition with the Village’s own lucrative station parking lot. Other exclusions foolishly targeted existing businesses—two local automobile dealerships and their storage lots. When the owner of the Dodge dealership discovered that if a fire destroyed more than 50% of his business, it could not be rebuilt, he moved his operation to the former Kayson property.
It turned out that Croton had shot itself in the foot by becoming a business-unfriendly community. Its punitive action actually created the empty Dodge dealership. Planners now call it an eyesore, and are pushing hard to eradicate it. For five years, Croton discouraged tax-paying businesses from coming here. Advocates of the Harmon scheme would have you believe that they can magically attract tenants to new apartments and storefronts in Harmon when existing facilities there are empty.
Other 2004 law prohibitions targeted businesses wanting to come to Croton. Its ban on drive-through windows was initially aimed at the Eckerd pharmacy chain. Eckerd wanted to buy the undeveloped Katz property, but the village said no to a planned drive-through window for prescription pickup. When the village attorney cautioned that it was unwise during negotiations to write a law solely directed at Eckerd, planners added fast-food restaurants to the list of banned businesses as cover.
Thoroughly disgusted, Eckerd decided it didn’t want to come to a community so openly hostile, and withdrew its offer for the Katz property. As TV hucksters say, “Wait, there’s more.” Another shot in the foot. After the Eckerd deal evaporated, the owner of the Katz property sued Croton, charging that the village had, by its actions, caused the purchase to fall through. Croton settled the suit by buying the property, thus taking it off the tax rolls.
Taxpayers are now the unwitting owners of a million-dollar white elephant yielding no taxes and worth less than what we paid for it. The village still doesn’t have a clue about what to do with its unintended acquisition. Such debacles are called “planning.” Meanwhile, we are being offered a snake-oil scheme that would destroy Harmon’s first and oldest surviving building.
In 2004 Croton declared war on business. Not all businesses, just businesses certain people arbitrarily decided they didn’t want here. The attack weapon was the Gateway Law. Zoning laws usually specify permitted businesses or occupations. Croton turned common practice upside down. It designated five categories of undesirable businesses that any community wanting tax revenue would have gladly welcomed. Croton’s message: “Keep out!”
This 2004 law’s ban on parking lots was probably intended to prevent competition with the Village’s own lucrative station parking lot. Other exclusions foolishly targeted existing businesses—two local automobile dealerships and their storage lots. When the owner of the Dodge dealership discovered that if a fire destroyed more than 50% of his business, it could not be rebuilt, he moved his operation to the former Kayson property.
It turned out that Croton had shot itself in the foot by becoming a business-unfriendly community. Its punitive action actually created the empty Dodge dealership. Planners now call it an eyesore, and are pushing hard to eradicate it. For five years, Croton discouraged tax-paying businesses from coming here. Advocates of the Harmon scheme would have you believe that they can magically attract tenants to new apartments and storefronts in Harmon when existing facilities there are empty.
Other 2004 law prohibitions targeted businesses wanting to come to Croton. Its ban on drive-through windows was initially aimed at the Eckerd pharmacy chain. Eckerd wanted to buy the undeveloped Katz property, but the village said no to a planned drive-through window for prescription pickup. When the village attorney cautioned that it was unwise during negotiations to write a law solely directed at Eckerd, planners added fast-food restaurants to the list of banned businesses as cover.
Thoroughly disgusted, Eckerd decided it didn’t want to come to a community so openly hostile, and withdrew its offer for the Katz property. As TV hucksters say, “Wait, there’s more.” Another shot in the foot. After the Eckerd deal evaporated, the owner of the Katz property sued Croton, charging that the village had, by its actions, caused the purchase to fall through. Croton settled the suit by buying the property, thus taking it off the tax rolls.
Taxpayers are now the unwitting owners of a million-dollar white elephant yielding no taxes and worth less than what we paid for it. The village still doesn’t have a clue about what to do with its unintended acquisition. Such debacles are called “planning.” Meanwhile, we are being offered a snake-oil scheme that would destroy Harmon’s first and oldest surviving building.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Backing Into Zoning Change 7
PLANNING
My wife and I have lived in Croton for almost a half-century. In 1963, having returned from living in Turkey and tired of coping in a New York hotel, we bought the first house we were shown. It was in Harmon. We’re still in that house. Over the years I fell in love with Croton’s history and wrote extensively about it for The Gazette and in my own blog, Postscripts.
The Harmon Committee’s proposal has many faults. Chief among them is their intention to destroy a historic building. At the northeast corner of Benedict Boulevard and South Riverside Avenue stands a nondescript structure housing a nail salon. Under the Harmon Committee’s plan, it's slated for destruction. How sad if that were to happen. What stories it could tell. It was the very first building constructed in Harmon. It was the sales office from which Clifford Harmon peddled his lots to city dwellers seeking inexpensive homes in the country. It was once the Harmon post office. Some villages would have already restored it, and it would be serving as a visitors' center.
In the mistaken notion that a building spree during an economic downturn will cause customers and tenants to flock magically to Harmon, this committee that doesn’t give a damn about history wants to raze Harmon’s first building, erect a three-story monstrosity, pave the remaining area and make it a parking lot. What’s next? The Van Cortlandt Manor House?
The time has come to put a stop to this nonsense. Any village that forgets its past cannot have much of a future. I call on all who love Croton’s rich history to rise up in protest. I also have a message for the Harmon Committee. Its membership includes self-appointed chairman Kieran Murray, a developer hell-bent on remaking Harmon for his own purposes, and members Joe Biber, Jeremy Ezra, Julie Evans, Doug Wehrle, and Leo Wiegman. By their passivity and silence, members have given tacit approval to Mr. Murray’s frequent spontaneous outbursts of irrational rants and rages.
Those who love Croton’s history are not going to stand idly by and let this committee destroy Harmon’s oldest building through irresponsible planning. Our response is taken from the film The Searchers, now a classic in the Western genre. It’s John Wayne’s laconic line, “That’ll be the day.”
My wife and I have lived in Croton for almost a half-century. In 1963, having returned from living in Turkey and tired of coping in a New York hotel, we bought the first house we were shown. It was in Harmon. We’re still in that house. Over the years I fell in love with Croton’s history and wrote extensively about it for The Gazette and in my own blog, Postscripts.
The Harmon Committee’s proposal has many faults. Chief among them is their intention to destroy a historic building. At the northeast corner of Benedict Boulevard and South Riverside Avenue stands a nondescript structure housing a nail salon. Under the Harmon Committee’s plan, it's slated for destruction. How sad if that were to happen. What stories it could tell. It was the very first building constructed in Harmon. It was the sales office from which Clifford Harmon peddled his lots to city dwellers seeking inexpensive homes in the country. It was once the Harmon post office. Some villages would have already restored it, and it would be serving as a visitors' center.
In the mistaken notion that a building spree during an economic downturn will cause customers and tenants to flock magically to Harmon, this committee that doesn’t give a damn about history wants to raze Harmon’s first building, erect a three-story monstrosity, pave the remaining area and make it a parking lot. What’s next? The Van Cortlandt Manor House?
The time has come to put a stop to this nonsense. Any village that forgets its past cannot have much of a future. I call on all who love Croton’s rich history to rise up in protest. I also have a message for the Harmon Committee. Its membership includes self-appointed chairman Kieran Murray, a developer hell-bent on remaking Harmon for his own purposes, and members Joe Biber, Jeremy Ezra, Julie Evans, Doug Wehrle, and Leo Wiegman. By their passivity and silence, members have given tacit approval to Mr. Murray’s frequent spontaneous outbursts of irrational rants and rages.
Those who love Croton’s history are not going to stand idly by and let this committee destroy Harmon’s oldest building through irresponsible planning. Our response is taken from the film The Searchers, now a classic in the Western genre. It’s John Wayne’s laconic line, “That’ll be the day.”
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Backing Into Zoning Change 6
PLANNING
Imagine a situation in which two members of a jury in a high-profile trial announce that they had made their minds up even before the trial opens. Next, imagine these same two jurors trying to convince the public of the rightness of their premature verdict by advocating for it at every opportunity. A similar troubling ethical problem is on display in Croton right now.
Two trustees who have each sworn to keep an open mind before voting on any law have been advocating changes to an existing law even before the new legislation has been framed. Of even greater concern is that the two trustees, Ann Gallelli, whose relationship to the Harmon Committee was only to be as liaison, and Richard Olver, are now actively lobbying for their premature support of the Committee’s unilateral recommendations. They do this despite evidence that all of Croton is in economic doldrums.
It is interesting to note that both Ms. Gallelli and Mr. Olver live far from Harmon and from any personal consequences of their hasty decision-making. A case in point is Mr. Olver’s recent letter to The Gazette. After two patronizing paragraphs in which he tries to scare residents with exaggerated rumors and then knocks down the straw men he has erected, Mr. Olver offers such gems of wisdom as: “The experts tell us the current zoning is not attractive for business investment and vacancies and empty lots in Harmon confirm this. The zoning change would make Harmon more attractive for the smaller businesses and professional offices we need to revive the area.” He concludes with, “The Harmon proposals would encourage private development of new, tax-paying commercial and professional space. Now isn't that something that we all want?”
When I voted for Mr. Olver last year, I never thought he would turn into a snake-oil salesman. It was experts, Mr. Olver, who gave us those three ugly gigantic parking lots in downtown Croton. The inadequate current zoning to which you refer happens to be the disastrous Gateway Law of 2004 that Ms. Gallelli pushed so hard on--the law that has not attracted a single new business investor to Croton in five years. Who’s going to take the fall for that?
Moreover, Harmon is not unique in vacancies. And Realtor Dick Albert would dispute that Croton needs more professional space; he owns plenty of such empty space. Finally, if you think that high-rent stores and high-rent apartments in Harmon will be Croton’s salvation, I’ve got a big dam I’d like to sell to you.
Imagine a situation in which two members of a jury in a high-profile trial announce that they had made their minds up even before the trial opens. Next, imagine these same two jurors trying to convince the public of the rightness of their premature verdict by advocating for it at every opportunity. A similar troubling ethical problem is on display in Croton right now.
Two trustees who have each sworn to keep an open mind before voting on any law have been advocating changes to an existing law even before the new legislation has been framed. Of even greater concern is that the two trustees, Ann Gallelli, whose relationship to the Harmon Committee was only to be as liaison, and Richard Olver, are now actively lobbying for their premature support of the Committee’s unilateral recommendations. They do this despite evidence that all of Croton is in economic doldrums.
It is interesting to note that both Ms. Gallelli and Mr. Olver live far from Harmon and from any personal consequences of their hasty decision-making. A case in point is Mr. Olver’s recent letter to The Gazette. After two patronizing paragraphs in which he tries to scare residents with exaggerated rumors and then knocks down the straw men he has erected, Mr. Olver offers such gems of wisdom as: “The experts tell us the current zoning is not attractive for business investment and vacancies and empty lots in Harmon confirm this. The zoning change would make Harmon more attractive for the smaller businesses and professional offices we need to revive the area.” He concludes with, “The Harmon proposals would encourage private development of new, tax-paying commercial and professional space. Now isn't that something that we all want?”
When I voted for Mr. Olver last year, I never thought he would turn into a snake-oil salesman. It was experts, Mr. Olver, who gave us those three ugly gigantic parking lots in downtown Croton. The inadequate current zoning to which you refer happens to be the disastrous Gateway Law of 2004 that Ms. Gallelli pushed so hard on--the law that has not attracted a single new business investor to Croton in five years. Who’s going to take the fall for that?
Moreover, Harmon is not unique in vacancies. And Realtor Dick Albert would dispute that Croton needs more professional space; he owns plenty of such empty space. Finally, if you think that high-rent stores and high-rent apartments in Harmon will be Croton’s salvation, I’ve got a big dam I’d like to sell to you.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Backing Into Zoning Change 5
PLANNING
Continuing the short history of Croton retailing: In the 1950s, the lower end of Route 129 (Maple Street) became home to the Van Wyck shopping complex, anchored by a Grand Union supermarket. The 1960s brought a competing A&P supermarket complex immediately opposite. Opening a new Croton post office next to the Grand Union in 1966 added to the parking problems of that complex. After the A&P decamped, the building was divided into small shops and called Croton Commons. This marked Phase 4 of Croton’s retail development.
In the fifth and final phase, the area south of Croton Point Avenue became the site of the most ambitious retail development in Croton history. Anchored by a ShopRite supermarket, it was built in the early 1970s, occupying space that previously had been a drive-in movie and a bowling alley. This latest supermarket complex and its massive parking lot only compounded the problems caused in Croton by the two competing shopping complexes facing one another across Maple Street. Eventually, it hastened their demise.
This village made a fatal planning mistake by shortsightedly adopting zoning that allowed supermarkets to be built in the very center of Croton, instead of at its periphery. Hard to believe, but at one time three giant supermarkets and their unsightly parking lots occupied the vibrant heart of the village. Add the giant station parking lot to the mix, and you have an example of what can happen when planning runs amuck: acres upon acres of parked automobiles, the ultimate malignant Automobile Age eyesore. Misguided planners took a workaday village whose richly layered architectural history from Early Georgian to Modern could easily be explored on a short walking tour and converted it into a planning nightmare, a disaster from which we may never recover.
By making automobile parking so central and accessible, planners not only caused congestive traffic problems, they effectively destroyed the “butchers, bakers and candlestick makers” in each of Croton’s original shopping areas. I call it “sudden death by supermarket.” As readers can deduce from these comments, I do not worship at the altar of the Great God of Planning. Hasty, ill-considered planning and zoning changes like those described above have caused more problems in Croton than they have solved. Those worried about the Harmon project should remember the havoc wrought by the Gateway zoning changes and the adage, “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.”
Continuing the short history of Croton retailing: In the 1950s, the lower end of Route 129 (Maple Street) became home to the Van Wyck shopping complex, anchored by a Grand Union supermarket. The 1960s brought a competing A&P supermarket complex immediately opposite. Opening a new Croton post office next to the Grand Union in 1966 added to the parking problems of that complex. After the A&P decamped, the building was divided into small shops and called Croton Commons. This marked Phase 4 of Croton’s retail development.
In the fifth and final phase, the area south of Croton Point Avenue became the site of the most ambitious retail development in Croton history. Anchored by a ShopRite supermarket, it was built in the early 1970s, occupying space that previously had been a drive-in movie and a bowling alley. This latest supermarket complex and its massive parking lot only compounded the problems caused in Croton by the two competing shopping complexes facing one another across Maple Street. Eventually, it hastened their demise.
This village made a fatal planning mistake by shortsightedly adopting zoning that allowed supermarkets to be built in the very center of Croton, instead of at its periphery. Hard to believe, but at one time three giant supermarkets and their unsightly parking lots occupied the vibrant heart of the village. Add the giant station parking lot to the mix, and you have an example of what can happen when planning runs amuck: acres upon acres of parked automobiles, the ultimate malignant Automobile Age eyesore. Misguided planners took a workaday village whose richly layered architectural history from Early Georgian to Modern could easily be explored on a short walking tour and converted it into a planning nightmare, a disaster from which we may never recover.
By making automobile parking so central and accessible, planners not only caused congestive traffic problems, they effectively destroyed the “butchers, bakers and candlestick makers” in each of Croton’s original shopping areas. I call it “sudden death by supermarket.” As readers can deduce from these comments, I do not worship at the altar of the Great God of Planning. Hasty, ill-considered planning and zoning changes like those described above have caused more problems in Croton than they have solved. Those worried about the Harmon project should remember the havoc wrought by the Gateway zoning changes and the adage, “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.”
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Backing Into Zoning Change 4
PLANNING
It is almost impossible to understand Croton’s intractable planning and retailing problems without first understanding its retailing history. Croton has five separate, non-contiguous retailing areas, best described as “nodes.” The five areas, in the order of their creation, are (1) North Riverside Avenue, (2) Grand Street, (3) Harmon, (4) the lower end of Route 129, and (5) the retailing complex below Croton Point Avenue.
The first three of these developed to serve the basic needs of their surrounding residential neighborhoods. River travel antedated road travel in the Hudson Valley. Two “landings” (i.e., docks) at the foot of Grand Street and Brook Street attracted settlement. Successively called Collabaugh Landing, Cortlandt Town and Croton Landing, the area later became known as Croton’s “Lower Village.”
This first phase of Croton’s development thrived first on market sloops, then on steamboat commerce on the Hudson, and was augmented by railroad passenger and freight service after 1849, centered on what later would become Croton North station. Long before the Expressway opened in 1967, condemnation and construction essentially destroyed the Lower Village, leaving only an anemic remnant on the east side of North Riverside Avenue.
Another settlement, later called the Upper Village, came into being after stagecoach and mail service began on the Albany Post Road. It eventually became a regular stage stop, complete with inn and stables for horses. Residences and retail shops clustered nearby to supply basic goods. This marked the second phase of Croton’s development. Two steep roads, Upper Landing Road (now Brook Street) and Lower Landing Road (now Grand Street) connected the Upper Village to the Lower Village.
The third phase came after 1903, when real estate developer Clifford B. Harmon bought from the surviving Van Cortlandt heirs the land that became Harmon-on-Hudson, the original name of the new community he platted on the steep hills. Using advertising campaigns in New York City newspapers, he began selling building lots in 1907. Because Harmon was not within easy walking distance of Croton’s two original retail areas, shops opened along South Riverside Avenue to supply basic amenities to new arrivals who built homes in the growing community. Similarly, the Chapel of the Good Shepherd opened to take care the religious needs of Harmon’s Catholic residents.
Although the community of Harmon was absorbed by Croton in 1932, the Post Office Department continued to maintain a Harmon post office until the mid-1960s. So insular is Harmon, a few die-hard old-timers still insist that they live in Harmon, not Croton.
It is almost impossible to understand Croton’s intractable planning and retailing problems without first understanding its retailing history. Croton has five separate, non-contiguous retailing areas, best described as “nodes.” The five areas, in the order of their creation, are (1) North Riverside Avenue, (2) Grand Street, (3) Harmon, (4) the lower end of Route 129, and (5) the retailing complex below Croton Point Avenue.
The first three of these developed to serve the basic needs of their surrounding residential neighborhoods. River travel antedated road travel in the Hudson Valley. Two “landings” (i.e., docks) at the foot of Grand Street and Brook Street attracted settlement. Successively called Collabaugh Landing, Cortlandt Town and Croton Landing, the area later became known as Croton’s “Lower Village.”
This first phase of Croton’s development thrived first on market sloops, then on steamboat commerce on the Hudson, and was augmented by railroad passenger and freight service after 1849, centered on what later would become Croton North station. Long before the Expressway opened in 1967, condemnation and construction essentially destroyed the Lower Village, leaving only an anemic remnant on the east side of North Riverside Avenue.
Another settlement, later called the Upper Village, came into being after stagecoach and mail service began on the Albany Post Road. It eventually became a regular stage stop, complete with inn and stables for horses. Residences and retail shops clustered nearby to supply basic goods. This marked the second phase of Croton’s development. Two steep roads, Upper Landing Road (now Brook Street) and Lower Landing Road (now Grand Street) connected the Upper Village to the Lower Village.
The third phase came after 1903, when real estate developer Clifford B. Harmon bought from the surviving Van Cortlandt heirs the land that became Harmon-on-Hudson, the original name of the new community he platted on the steep hills. Using advertising campaigns in New York City newspapers, he began selling building lots in 1907. Because Harmon was not within easy walking distance of Croton’s two original retail areas, shops opened along South Riverside Avenue to supply basic amenities to new arrivals who built homes in the growing community. Similarly, the Chapel of the Good Shepherd opened to take care the religious needs of Harmon’s Catholic residents.
Although the community of Harmon was absorbed by Croton in 1932, the Post Office Department continued to maintain a Harmon post office until the mid-1960s. So insular is Harmon, a few die-hard old-timers still insist that they live in Harmon, not Croton.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Backing Into Zoning Change 3
PLANNING
Unfortunately, Croton is not what entrepreneurs consider a hot prospect for retail investment. Since the Croton Expressway opened, our village has been a backwater, bypassed by a 12.9-mile stub of limited-access highway. Originally intended to be part of a superhighway along the east bank of the Hudson connecting the Tappan Zee Bridge with the Newburgh-Beacon Bridge, its purpose was to take traffic pressure off the Saw Mill and Taconic parkways.
The Croton Expressway was the only portion built. Unlike many other Hudson Valley post-industrial communities, Croton was suddenly relieved of the north-south traffic that once passed through on Riverside Avenue (formerly Route 9, now 9A). Motorists on the Expressway bypassing Croton at better than 55 miles an hour are oblivious to what its shops have to offer—or that it even has shops. With the Expressway’s diversion of through traffic a reality, Croton’s retail customer base was diminished, leaving Croton’s population as its shops’ principal customers.
This has had a significant effect on the kind and number of retail establishments that can start up and flourish here. It’s also the reason we should all shop locally lest more shops fail. Croton welcomed the Expressway, but paid dearly for the tradeoff in reduced retail business. Even in times of prosperity, total occupancy of Croton’s existing retail space has been difficult to achieve. According to the New York State Department of Transportation, the Expressway handles approximately 40,000 motor vehicles per day. Had they been traveling on Riverside Avenue, a fraction of these potential customers might have been inclined to stop and make purchases in shops along Riverside Avenue, including in Harmon.
In creating three gateways with the idea of welcoming motorists exiting the Expressway to shop in Croton, planners made a fatal error. They neglected to gather marketing data by stationing one person with a clipboard at each “gateway” for a day or two to ask motorists, “Are you coming to Croton to shop?” Had they done this they would have discovered that few cars exit the Expressway for the purpose of shopping. Wishful planning created imaginary gateways on paper to accommodate phantom motorcades of shoppers that will never appear. Proponents of zoning change and a revamped Harmon are simply closing their eyes to the existence of the Expressway and its attenuating effect on retail trade in Croton.
Unfortunately, Croton is not what entrepreneurs consider a hot prospect for retail investment. Since the Croton Expressway opened, our village has been a backwater, bypassed by a 12.9-mile stub of limited-access highway. Originally intended to be part of a superhighway along the east bank of the Hudson connecting the Tappan Zee Bridge with the Newburgh-Beacon Bridge, its purpose was to take traffic pressure off the Saw Mill and Taconic parkways.
The Croton Expressway was the only portion built. Unlike many other Hudson Valley post-industrial communities, Croton was suddenly relieved of the north-south traffic that once passed through on Riverside Avenue (formerly Route 9, now 9A). Motorists on the Expressway bypassing Croton at better than 55 miles an hour are oblivious to what its shops have to offer—or that it even has shops. With the Expressway’s diversion of through traffic a reality, Croton’s retail customer base was diminished, leaving Croton’s population as its shops’ principal customers.
This has had a significant effect on the kind and number of retail establishments that can start up and flourish here. It’s also the reason we should all shop locally lest more shops fail. Croton welcomed the Expressway, but paid dearly for the tradeoff in reduced retail business. Even in times of prosperity, total occupancy of Croton’s existing retail space has been difficult to achieve. According to the New York State Department of Transportation, the Expressway handles approximately 40,000 motor vehicles per day. Had they been traveling on Riverside Avenue, a fraction of these potential customers might have been inclined to stop and make purchases in shops along Riverside Avenue, including in Harmon.
In creating three gateways with the idea of welcoming motorists exiting the Expressway to shop in Croton, planners made a fatal error. They neglected to gather marketing data by stationing one person with a clipboard at each “gateway” for a day or two to ask motorists, “Are you coming to Croton to shop?” Had they done this they would have discovered that few cars exit the Expressway for the purpose of shopping. Wishful planning created imaginary gateways on paper to accommodate phantom motorcades of shoppers that will never appear. Proponents of zoning change and a revamped Harmon are simply closing their eyes to the existence of the Expressway and its attenuating effect on retail trade in Croton.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Backing Into Zoning Change 2
PLANNING
In 2004, an elaborate “Gateway Law” was concocted by consultants to rezone and make retail areas in Croton more inviting to new businesses. Its local sponsors assured us, “Pass it and they [new businesses] will come.” Well, we passed it, and five years later they haven’t come. And they won’t be coming. Apparently, no one noticed that the new law’s discriminatory zoning changes were actually inimical to new business.
Hardly a testament to the free-enterprise system, the Gateway Law definitely was not Croton’s finest hour. In fact, it has been a disaster. Yet the head of the ad hoc committee, Kieran Murray, calls this law “brilliant.” In what can only be described as the Sovietizing of Croton business, the Gateway Law shamelessly dictated what entities can and cannot operate here. Among the five banned categories were “fast-food restaurants”--although no definition of the term was offered.
When I quizzed then-trustee Georgianna Grant, my friend and a prime mover of this legislation, about what constituted a fast-food restaurant, she alluded to “Golden Arches” and said bluntly, “We don’t want places like McDonald’s or Burger King here.” Obviously, Croton emulates Humpty Dumpty in "Alice in Wonderland," who, pressed by Alice for a meaning, says, “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean.”
Despite the Gateway Law’s prohibition of fast-food establishments, it was selectively enforced. Pizza parlors, a Dunkin’ Donuts, a Subway sandwich shop and the Mex-to-Go blossomed. All clearly fall under the rubric of “fast-food restaurants.” My beef isn’t with these establishments, a plus for any community, but with Croton’s deliberately anti-business legislation. In their misapplied zeal to brand certain legitimate businesses as taboo, the authors of the Gateway Law were curiously blind to socially undesirable businesses. Body-piercing salon? Yes! McDonald’s or Burger King? No! Brilliant, indeed!
We sowed the wind with the Gateway Law and inevitably reaped the whirlwind and are still reaping it. How many potentially tax-paying businesses were turned off by that Law’s unfriendliness to business can never be known. Instead of portraying Croton as snooty and anti-business, we should have welcomed any legitimate business willing to come here and invest its dollars in this community.
Croton can consider itself lucky that some national chain of fast-food restaurants with deep pockets hasn’t challenged this inequitable legislation in court as an unconstitutional denial of its due process rights. (For reasons why, see next installment)
In 2004, an elaborate “Gateway Law” was concocted by consultants to rezone and make retail areas in Croton more inviting to new businesses. Its local sponsors assured us, “Pass it and they [new businesses] will come.” Well, we passed it, and five years later they haven’t come. And they won’t be coming. Apparently, no one noticed that the new law’s discriminatory zoning changes were actually inimical to new business.
Hardly a testament to the free-enterprise system, the Gateway Law definitely was not Croton’s finest hour. In fact, it has been a disaster. Yet the head of the ad hoc committee, Kieran Murray, calls this law “brilliant.” In what can only be described as the Sovietizing of Croton business, the Gateway Law shamelessly dictated what entities can and cannot operate here. Among the five banned categories were “fast-food restaurants”--although no definition of the term was offered.
When I quizzed then-trustee Georgianna Grant, my friend and a prime mover of this legislation, about what constituted a fast-food restaurant, she alluded to “Golden Arches” and said bluntly, “We don’t want places like McDonald’s or Burger King here.” Obviously, Croton emulates Humpty Dumpty in "Alice in Wonderland," who, pressed by Alice for a meaning, says, “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean.”
Despite the Gateway Law’s prohibition of fast-food establishments, it was selectively enforced. Pizza parlors, a Dunkin’ Donuts, a Subway sandwich shop and the Mex-to-Go blossomed. All clearly fall under the rubric of “fast-food restaurants.” My beef isn’t with these establishments, a plus for any community, but with Croton’s deliberately anti-business legislation. In their misapplied zeal to brand certain legitimate businesses as taboo, the authors of the Gateway Law were curiously blind to socially undesirable businesses. Body-piercing salon? Yes! McDonald’s or Burger King? No! Brilliant, indeed!
We sowed the wind with the Gateway Law and inevitably reaped the whirlwind and are still reaping it. How many potentially tax-paying businesses were turned off by that Law’s unfriendliness to business can never be known. Instead of portraying Croton as snooty and anti-business, we should have welcomed any legitimate business willing to come here and invest its dollars in this community.
Croton can consider itself lucky that some national chain of fast-food restaurants with deep pockets hasn’t challenged this inequitable legislation in court as an unconstitutional denial of its due process rights. (For reasons why, see next installment)
Backing Into Zoning Change 1
PLANNING
Croton residents are being importuned to get behind legislation to rezone the Harmon area. Two-story mixed-use buildings are now permitted there. In essence, the change would permit three-story mixed-use with retail stores at street level and increased residential density on two stories above. The Democratic minority trustees are plumping for this plan, arguing that we will reap additional taxes from the change. But if anyone asks, “Why the hurry?” the answer is always the same: “The Committee has been working on this for three years.”
I find this argument hollow. “The Committee” is an ad hoc group, mostly made up of Democrats who are also residents of Harmon. By way of disclosure, I live at the northern margins of Harmon. I am a registered Democrat. I cast my first vote in 1940 for FDR, having turned 21 the year before. I was not aware that Harmon’s problems were unique or that its business climate was different from other retailing neighborhoods in Croton. I’m not a lawyer, but I do recall that under the law of New York (and other states) “spot zoning”--changing zoning to accommodate an individual or narrow group of individuals--is illegal. If spot zoning is illegal, “spot planning” that leads to an attempt at spot zoning should be discouraged. If we are going to spend taxpayers’ dollars for planning studies, as was done here, these should encompass all of Croton instead of addressing the problems of an individual neighborhood.
Moreover, if retail occupancy in Harmon is the most urgent problem requiring immediate resolution by the Village, then Croton is indeed in a bad way. I can think of a half-dozen more pressing problems that need attention. The truth is Croton’s residential taxpayers have been bearing a disproportionate share of the tax burden for almost 39 years. On June 21, 1970, Croton’s tax base became catastrophically unbalanced. I can identify the date so specifically because on that day Croton’s largest taxpayer, the Penn-Central Railroad, filed for bankruptcy protection. Croton residents have borne an unfair share of the tax burden ever since.
Instead of chasing will-o’-the-wisp instant panaceas, we ought to be hunkering down to see how the current recession/depression plays out in Croton and how many businesses (and residents) survive. So I, too, ask, “Why the hurry?”
Croton residents are being importuned to get behind legislation to rezone the Harmon area. Two-story mixed-use buildings are now permitted there. In essence, the change would permit three-story mixed-use with retail stores at street level and increased residential density on two stories above. The Democratic minority trustees are plumping for this plan, arguing that we will reap additional taxes from the change. But if anyone asks, “Why the hurry?” the answer is always the same: “The Committee has been working on this for three years.”
I find this argument hollow. “The Committee” is an ad hoc group, mostly made up of Democrats who are also residents of Harmon. By way of disclosure, I live at the northern margins of Harmon. I am a registered Democrat. I cast my first vote in 1940 for FDR, having turned 21 the year before. I was not aware that Harmon’s problems were unique or that its business climate was different from other retailing neighborhoods in Croton. I’m not a lawyer, but I do recall that under the law of New York (and other states) “spot zoning”--changing zoning to accommodate an individual or narrow group of individuals--is illegal. If spot zoning is illegal, “spot planning” that leads to an attempt at spot zoning should be discouraged. If we are going to spend taxpayers’ dollars for planning studies, as was done here, these should encompass all of Croton instead of addressing the problems of an individual neighborhood.
Moreover, if retail occupancy in Harmon is the most urgent problem requiring immediate resolution by the Village, then Croton is indeed in a bad way. I can think of a half-dozen more pressing problems that need attention. The truth is Croton’s residential taxpayers have been bearing a disproportionate share of the tax burden for almost 39 years. On June 21, 1970, Croton’s tax base became catastrophically unbalanced. I can identify the date so specifically because on that day Croton’s largest taxpayer, the Penn-Central Railroad, filed for bankruptcy protection. Croton residents have borne an unfair share of the tax burden ever since.
Instead of chasing will-o’-the-wisp instant panaceas, we ought to be hunkering down to see how the current recession/depression plays out in Croton and how many businesses (and residents) survive. So I, too, ask, “Why the hurry?”
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