Where’s Our Comprehensive Plan?

ABG knows there’s a committee at Town Hall, but all there has been from the administration is a lot of lip service as to the importance of having a Comprehensive Plan, without actually having one. Lately, along with comments that it’s due for a review, adjustments and changes and so on, will we ever receive any notifications from the Steering Committee that we’ll soon see some “rubber hitting the proverbial road”?

Mr Feiner rushes development proposals through the Town’s review processes as if being chased by the Steering Committee seeking his sign-off on their Comprehensive Plan. He’s cavalierly making numerous zoning changes, mostly recommending larger buildings in the Town at numerous locations before a plan can be adopted. An example is his convoluted efforts to make sure GameOn 365 is the only winner for the former Frank’s Nursery property at 715 Dobbs Ferry Road. He has instructed his Town Board to now have Planning Commissioner Thomas “Build It Bigger” Madden into developing a possible recreation district for the corridor where neighborhood civic associations have emphatically said their needs are to have it scaled down.

It would seem that a serious look at Greenburgh’s future is in order. Just last week County Executive Robert Astorino mentioned at a candidate’s debate that White Plains is likely to be the transportation hub for any mass transit coming off the new Tappan Zee Bridge and along the 1-287 corridor. Mayor Tom Roach has been heard saying the same thing. Mr Feiner has ignored the difficult traffic conditions and flooding in Fulton Park, which is the last touch of Greenburgh on the path into White Plains and their transportation parking lot. He routinely supported more mass transportation even though the infrastructure doesn’t support it or has been addressed for future improvements. The proverbial, “Build it and they will come,” mentality will give little, if no relief to traffic congestion in the area.

The CEO of White Plains Hospital has been very outspoken about the need for more real estate for a medical center that is bursting at the seams on its current campus. There are plans for more retail development on Bloomingdale Road and another on the Post Road. Central Avenue has been targeted by Mr Feiner and Mr Madden for even more development. Who will fill these businesses? Where will all these shoppers come from? How will an area already dying a slow death with overdevelopment survive even the smallest storm, where flooding practically happens when it gets cloudy? Can we work to fill the vacant store fronts and offices with more than Dollar Stores and Nail Spas? Parking that costs more than the merchandise being sold says volumes.

The traffic situation in the area is already overwhelming as our roadways and tempers are bursting at the seams. Mr Feiner and his Board blatantly ignore all traffic reports which reinforces the fact that all of our areas being expanded upon receive a failing grade. Numbers can be presented in many ways, assuring the outcome desired by the presenter. Every neighborhood that complains about traffic is pushed to the side so Mr Feiner can wave his “payoff wand”, granting another developer carte blanche over the beleaguered residents. We don’t count. But how much more can the Town of Greenburgh absorb? How much longer until a willfully ignorant electorate rises from the couch of indifference and begins to take note of the metamorphosis of their Town? Is this what they signed on for when they bought their homes? This explains why the expression of not being able to fight City Hall resonates among so many.

Mr Feiner talks about riding bicycles for moving residents but offers no bike paths, racks or ideas to improve biking throughout the Town. Traffic and cyclists, and lets not forget those pesky pedestrians, just don’t mix. Not all of us live in expensive gated communities such as his bucolic Boulder Ridge where riding a bicycle is a relatively safe adventure. It seems that much more thought needs to go into how much Greenburgh can do. Actually, ABG wonders if any thought has been given to what Greenburgh should and might do? We welcome a Comprehensive Plan for the Town. We trust it will slow or even stop our out-of-control Town Board from spot-zoning for every project and every developer.

It’s time for a Comprehensive Plan for the Town of Greenburgh. It’s also time for Mr Feiner to stop playing games with the Steering Committee and let them come forth with a proposal, have the review process and get this show on the congested road.