Upper Port Jeff Apartment Complex Plans Move Forward

Upper Port Jeff Apartment Complex Plans Move Forward

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The location where Port Jeff expects to run Station Street, next to a proposed apartment complex. Photo from Google maps

Plans for an affordable apartment complex planned in upper Port Jefferson continue to make progress with a public hearing set for July 9. If all goes well, the next step would be site plan approval. 

The apartment complex now being called Port Jefferson Crossing would be located directly adjacent to the Long Island Rail Road train station and would take over the property of a now-decrepit cafe.

During a Port Jefferson Village Planning Board work session on June 11, developers provided new details on the project. 

Joanna Cuevas, senior project director for Conifer Realty, said the apartment complex will be a part of upper Port Jefferson’s ongoing revitalization efforts. 

“We want to provide high quality affordable workforce housing,” she said. 

Current plans cite the three-story complex will have 45 units in total, 37 one-bedroom apartments and eight two-bedroom apartments. The complex will also offer over 3,100 square feet of retail space.

“The units are targeted at households earning between 30 percent and 95 percent area median income for Suffolk County, with an average income of $37,000 up to $111,000 for a family of four,” Cuevas said. 

Building amenities will include a covered parking garage, a community room, laundry facilities and a gym. 

The project will facilitate the creation of Station Street, a one-way road that provides entry to the adjacent parking lots just north of the train station parking lot and just before the initial footprint for the proposed development. 

Mark Owen, civil engineer for R&W Engineers in Hauppauge, said the road will also have an access driveway to the east of the building, where there will be a door for the complex’s underground parking. 

Cars will be entering Station Street from the west, then going into the Long Island Rail Road parking lot at the curb cut in and then exiting out onto Oakland Avenue. Developers said they want to get as many cars off Main Street and on their way. 

Members of the Planning Board expressed concern with the amount of cars that could be on Station Street. 

“[Route] 112 gets really backed up down to North Country Road and it seems like it will be a shortcut for the majority of the people who want to go east,” said board member Tom Vulpis. 

Alison LaPointe, special village attorney for Building & Planning Department, said they actually want people to use the new 20-foot-wide street. 

“That’s the village’s hope: As part of our comprehensive plan update, we are very excited that Station Street is going in because the goal is to get as many people off that very busy roadway and away from Sheep Pasture Road as quickly as possible,” she said. “Also [it will get] the Suffolk County bus routes off of that stop right by the tracks — it leads to a significant amount of backup into Port Jefferson Station.” 

A public hearing is set for July 9 during a 5 p.m. Planning Board meeting, which will likely be held remotely online and can be watched live via the village’s YouTube page.