Since it was last reviewed by the Town of New Paltz Planning Board nearly a year ago, plans for the proposed New Paltz Industry Hub at 53 North Ohioville Road have both come into greater focus and changed considerably.
At a meeting held on Monday, January 8, property co-owner and developer Matt Eyler explained that the project has undergone numerous changes, many shaped by feedback from the planning board.
“It took us a while to sort of figure out the design of the site that we wanted,” Eyler said. “We’ve come to you a couple times just to get your guidance on whether we’re in the right sort of ballpark and it seems like we got the usage reviewed and the sewer capacity reviewed. I mean whatever the effluent amount and the parking and other things like that. So now we’ve got an actual site plan that includes parking, lighting and stormwater and we’re just trying to move it along.”
In a summary from June 2021, plans for the project on the roughly 62-acre property included the construction of four 12,000-square-foot buildings as rental units for possible use as flex office, art studio, music studio, commercial kitchen, wholesale, contractor workshops, or light manufacturing. Since then, the proposed project has turned into a single 30,000-square-foot building with the option of six separate interior spaces of equal size.
Eyler said approval of the broad range of possible uses would allow the developers to expand their potential tenant base.
“That is why we’re taking the approach of trying to work it out with all of you to get the more intensive uses approved,” he said. “We’re just trying to create enough flexibility for ourselves that we can go out and have some latitude in terms of what types of tenants we choose, because it’s really hard to know exactly who’s going to come in. And luckily the light industrial zone does allow for quite a broad selection of possible tenants, and that’s what’s so cool about the spot.”
That methodology is also guiding the design of the project.
“The goal here is to create some fairly utilitarian space that people can afford and that people can occupy and grow their businesses,” Eyler said. “So our plan, at least as it stands now, it’s probably to do your basic prefabricated steel building. It’s a flex warehouse type of space.”
The proposal also includes a 52-space parking lot on the south side of the building, with the eventual option of adding an access road and more parking on the north side.
The project would be built just to the east of freshwater wetland, and while not encroaching on that area would still require vegetative removal, the disturbance and grading of the ground where the new buildings, accessways and parking areas, and stormwater management systems would reside. Two single-family homes and other outbuildings in various states of disrepair to the north of the proposed development would remain.
The plans also include a request for connection to the town’s sewer district.
“It’s not a ton of effluent we’re intending to create,” Eyler said. “We’re trying to get an okay for around 3,000 gallons, which isn’t a tremendous amount a day.”
Eyler added that the project’s addition to a problematic sewer district could be a great asset to all other properties connected to it.
“If you have more people in the district, it’s a more robust district,” he said. “One of the problems with that district all along has been that it’s so few homes on it, it’s very hard to fund anything.”
Larry Marshall, an engineer with Pine Bush-based Mercurio-Norton-Tarolli-Marshall said that since their last time before the planning board in March 2023, the project has taken greater shape.
“We’ve advanced that to a full preliminary plan with lighting, landscaping, water, sewer, stormwater,” Marshall said. “It hasn’t changed in substance substantially from what we presented then, it’s a more advanced plan.”
Even so, planning board members asked that the plans include more information, such as building elevations and proposed signage, to ensure they meet municipal code.
Developers and planning board members agreed that the project should be a bit further along before they plan any public hearings, but they did agree that it would be appropriate to bring in the town board and various Ulster County agencies to help move the process along.
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