Floral Park officials submit request to halt Belmont Park construction

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An attorney representing the Village of Floral Park filed a request with a state judge on Nov. 1 for a temporary restraining order to halt construction at Belmont Park.

Work by New York Arena Partners on the park’s redevelopment pro-ject began at the end of September. The plan approved by Empire State Development, the agency that promotes development around the state, includes a 250-room hotel, a community center, commercial office space, 350,000 square feet of retail space and a 19,000-seat arena for the New York Islanders.

In court documents submitted along with the request, Michael Murphy, the attorney representing Floral Park, detailed the village’s arguments for an “immediate cessation of all staging and New York Racing Association-support activities from the eastern portion of the North Lot,” construction-related truck traffic on Plainfield Avenue and “sheet pile driving activities.”

“The Village of Floral Park and its residents are already suffering real and significant adverse impacts” from the construction, the documents read, including unsafe traffic conditions and increased traffic on Plainfield Avenue, constant noise and “regular obnoxious odors of horse urine and manure” since NYRA was forced to move its horse-related operations during construction.

In the request, Murphy explained that road conditions may worsen as the state completes its Long Island Rail Road Third Track project in the area — whose effects, Murphy argued, Empire State Development refused to study. He added that while New York Arena Partners provided “a small group of residents” with construction-noise mitigation measures, no such measures have been provided to those already bothered by the noise.

Regarding increased traffic related to the construction, Murphy said that because commercial vehicles are prohibited on the Cross Island Parkway, they are forced to use residential streets, where they produce congestion.

Murphy also refuted Empire State Development traffic consultant Erik Metzger’s claim that construction would not affect traffic, saying that it is “already demonstrably incorrect,” and that it was emblematic of faults in NYAP and ESD’s methodology in studying the effects of the project, and claimed that conditions would only worsen as it moves forward.

“Construction activities . . . have and will continue to result in irreparable harm, with the worst of the impacts expected to occur imminently,” Murphy wrote.

He declined to comment on the filing, but Jack Sterne, an ESD spokesman, called it “nothing more than another attempt by the Village of Floral Park to thwart the Belmont redevelopment simply because the village doesn’t like the project.”

The request came a week after Arena Partners asked a state judge to dismiss Floral Park’s ongoing lawsuit against the project that it filed in September. It alleges that the final environmental impact statement, released this summer, included new information about an Elmont Long Island Rail Road station and a plan to include two 30,000 gallon tanks of liquid petroleum, that there was a “coordinated effort among state officials to clear the path for NYAP’s proposal,” and that ESD did not consider the effects of the retail space on Floral Park and Elmont’s business communities.

In the restraining order filing, Murphy reiterated the claims, but added, “The residents of the village should not be subjected to the effects of the pile driving while the court considers the preliminary injunction motion.”

NYAP refuted these claims, however, in a legal response filed on Oct. 25, claiming, “There is simply no legal basis to hold this project up.”

The partners — a consortium comprising the Islanders hockey franchise, Oak View Group and the Wilpon family — wrote that, under New York state law, ESD had the right to decide how to evaluate traffic concerns, and said that the draft environmental impact statement implied that a new railroad station might be one of the ways to reduce traffic.

Arena Partners further explained that not including a shopping district at Belmont Park would contradict EDS’s “goal of creating a year-round full-time gateway and economic engine in western Nassau County,” and argued that the petroleum would not have catastrophic effects.

Finally, Arena Partners disputed claims of secrecy surrounding Belmont Park, saying that ESD had publicized proposed additions to the project through draft notice submissions to the state Department of Environmental Conservation, which is required to release weekly notifications on proposals submitted to the agency.

But, according to Elmont activist Tammie Williams, NYAP and the ESD originally asked the judge to separate the Floral Park and Elmont lawsuits, and only submitted the request to dismiss Floral Park’s after the judge refused.

Williams also argued that the project should be halted because the state found traces of Agent Orange at the site of the proposed Elmont railroad station, pointing to a News 12 video from September. In the video, a Bellerose Terrace resident expressed her concern that the Agent Orange the Metropolitan Transportation Authority used in the 1970s as an herbicide would become airborne. Agent Orange is linked to cancer, diabetes and birth defects. In response, a LIRR spokeswoman in the video said the herbicide was only found in trace amounts.

Bellerose Terrace activists have since signed on to the Floral Park lawsuit.

Not everyone in the community opposes the project. Elmont resident Jon Johnson has been a vocal supporter of it, saying it will help the community economically. Speaking to the Herald, he called the Floral Park village officials disingenuous because “they continue to say they are not trying to stop the project, but continue to take measures to stop the project.”

Johnson added, “Many Elmont residents are anxiously anticipating the completion of the entire project.”

Representatives of Floral Park and Elmont are due back in court to discuss their pending lawsuits on Dec. 6.