Zoning change that would allow Patchogue hotel goes before village board Monday
An artist’s rendering shows the proposed Tempo hotel, which would have 109 rooms. Credit: JM2 Architecture/Tom Guarino
The proposal to build a 109-room luxury hotel-apartment complex in Patchogue will come up for a vote Monday night by the village board, Mayor Paul Pontieri said.
The board will vote on whether to grant a zoning change that would allow developer West Avenue Partners to build a Hilton Tempo hotel at the site of a shuttered bowling alley. It would be the South Shore village's only hotel, officials have said.
Supporters say the hotel, at the corner of West Avenue and Division Street, would put a capstone on decades-long efforts to revitalize the formerly moribund village.
The $40 million, five-story hotel would have 96 hotel rooms and 13 rental apartments, the developer's lawyers and architects have said. West Avenue Partners is asking the village to rezone the site from industrial to a special category for hotels.
The village board was cleared to take action Wednesday when the Suffolk County Planning Commission voted 12-0, with one abstention, not to block the project. The commission ruled the hotel would not have a negative effect on nearby roads, buildings and waterways owned or managed by the county such as Main Street and the Sixth District Court building.
“Obviously, it’s in an already developed area. There’s a need for a hotel," Commissioner Lisa Perry, the commission's Brookhaven Town representative, said before the vote. "I think it’s nice to have a hotel near a lot of transportation. It would be a definite positive for the downtown revitalization.”
The hotel would be across the street from Patchogue's Long Island Rail Road station and adjacent to the Watch Hill ferry terminal.
Commissioner Michael Kaufman, who abstained, echoed concerns expressed by some Patchogue residents that the hotel site is prone to flooding and may not have enough parking. Developers have said there would be 119 parking stalls.
“My big problem with this is we’re putting residential in a flood zone," Kaufman said. “We don’t like to put anything in a flood zone.”
Village officials have instructed the hotel's developers to submit a plan for drainage improvements at the site, Newsday previously reported.
Kaufman also called the five-story building "kind of dense," adding, “this is going to stick up quite nicely from out of nowhere.”
Pontieri, who supports the project, said additional hotel parking will be available at the village-owned parking lot at the train station, which he said will be a short walk from the hotel.
“The railroad [has] a municipal lot owned by us across the street," the mayor said in an interview. "That only fills up a third or two-thirds even on the busiest day. There’s plenty of parking.”
He added that Patchogue officials are holding discussions with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority about obscuring views of an LIRR rail yard adjacent to the parking lot by installing plantings between the yard and the hotel site.
Pontieri said the hotel will be no taller than some other buildings in the village, noting the New Village mixed-use complex on West Main Street also is five stories.
“We have four buildings in the village that are five stories," Pontieri said. "It’s not out of character in the village.”
He said if the village board approves the rezoning, the project will need approvals from the village planning and zoning boards before construction can begin.
Carl MacGowan is a Long Island native who covers Brookhaven Town after having previously covered Smithtown, Suffolk County courts and numerous spot news and feature stories over his 20-plus year career at Newsday.
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