Dan's Papers - March 13, 2009 - Citizens Spearhead Riverhead Projects

For years, Main Street in Riverhead has been on the precipice of becoming a major center on the East End - one that could attract visitors from all over Long Island.

Once a major, thriving hub in Suffolk County, historic downtown Riverhead - which now is home to at least 25 empty storefronts since Eastenders Coffee House closed in February - has seen a decline. Many believe that was largely due to the development of the Tanger outlets and other big box and chain stores that moved to County Road 58, drawing with them all the shoppers who once frequented the mom and pops on Main Street. Though the waterfront has been cleaned up, many attempts to revive the ailing business district have been unsuccessful and the area has never regained the momentum it once had.

Now, though, while the Town government continues to mull over plans for the area and work toward slowly building it up, two local businessmen are taking matters into their own hands in hopes of giving the downtown the jump start it needs. Ray Pickersgille, who owns Robert James Salon, and his business partner Anthony Coates, an investment banker by trade, will be opening up a mini mall, with room for 20 to 25 small vendors, in one of the old Swezey buildings on Main Street. Ever since announcing the project, Coates says his phone hasn't stopped ringing with calls from potential vendors - mostly dry goods shops that currently have a large presence on the Internet and are looking for a brick and mortar counterpart. While the building is something of an "eBay with walls," a major component of the project will be a farmer's market offering goods from local farms and wineries. There will also be space available for community organizations to use for various types of events. And if all goes as planned, the market might be open as early as this spring.

"What we want to be is an incubator," said Coates, who thinks the project could also help these smaller vendors grow to the point where they might eventually take on their own storefronts on Main Street. "What happens in this kind of setting is that once these businesses get legs underneath them and an audience in a small spot, then they'll move up the street. They get bigger and bigger."

If this first mini mall is a success, Coates and Pickersgille plan to open others like it in downtown Riverhead. The buildings in Riverhead lend themselves perfectly to the idea, since many of them have large real estate footprints and are difficult for independent shops to afford on their own. The pair came up with the idea after they grew tired of the Town's slow moving plans to revitalize downtown, and wanted to create something that could inject some immediate energy and movement into the area.

"One of the major criticisms I have of the vision the Town's painted for Riverhead is that it's centered around large, futuristic projects," said Coates, who thinks the area needs to see changes sooner, rather than later. "In downtown Riverhead, there is a dearth of economic activity. It's sad. The downtown gets talked about a lot. It should be humming."

At the same time, there are several other projects in the works for Riverhead. With plans for a 45,000 square foot mixed use project (which would include 52 affordable apartment units and retail and restaurant space), along the waterfront developer Ray Dickhoff recently tore down the building next to the Vail-Leavitt Music Hall. He has further plans to demolish two other rundown adjacent buildings - the Club 91 building and the small building next to that. He'll likely start construction by the end of the summer.

Also, Atlantis Marine World has plans to expand with a 108-room hotel and additional retail space. Apollo Real Estate Developers in planning to turn the old Woolworth building, across the street from the Suffolk Theatre, into a five-story Marriott hotel with retail space, a spa and a catering facility. Nine new civil courtrooms will be built just off Main Street.

And Castaldi Restoration and Construction, owners of the Suffolk, which has been empty since it closed in 1987, was ordered by a judge last week to hand the theatre back over to the Town after failing to accomplish anything on the property. "It was a disappointment the developer didn't do what he said," said Riverhead Town Supervisor Phil Cardinale. Many believe that, if put back in use, the theatre could be the anchor downtown Riverhead so sorely needs

The Town is also doing its part, focusing on public spaces in order to create a greenbelt along the Peconic River. Currently, it's working on downgrading the river's status from recreational to community, which would allow non-river related commercial, industrial, governmental and institutional uses along the Peconic. The Town hopes to purchase as many of the approximately 70 parcels along the riverfront to preserve as open, public space. It already owns five of these parcels, most recently purchasing the Weeping Willow Motel last week for $2 million with help from a grant from New York State. Riverhead Town also recently borrowed $70 million against the future income from the Community Preservation Fund for the next three decades. "We want to focus on what's there," said Chris Kempner, the Town's community development director, "and the river is the major attribute Riverhead has." Kempner also hopes that many of the businesses on Main Street will take advantage of the river and reorient themselves toward the waterfront. "We've had some growing pains, but I think it's coming around. I think there's something moving right now."

Cardinale says the Town is focusing on redeveloping Riverhead as a tourist center. The town already boasts several museums: Atlantis, The Long Island Science Museum, the Railroad Museum of Long Island and The Suffolk County Historical Society Museum. And each summer, Riverhead hosts several huge events that attract large crowds to the area, including the Riverhead Blues Festival, Riverhead Community Mosaic Street Painting Festival and the Polish Festival. This year the Town is introducing a new event to the mix: Riverfest, a paddleboat festival, on June 27. Also in the works, though it's not planned to open until 2013, is the proposed Riverhead Resorts, a 755-acre recreational and resort complex with eight themed resorts, including an indoor snow mountain, on the former Grumman property in Calverton. This could bring significant traffic to the area, and hopefully, Cardinale says, to the downtown.

"We have a lot of resources. What we need is to find the developers who will put their money where their mouth is," he said. "There's a lot of potential downtown. It's a venture capitalist's dream. It really is surprising it hasn't turned around already, but it has good prospects."