Riverhead considers ban on logistics centers and truck terminals in most industrial areas

The development of logistics centers, last-mile fulfillment centers and truck terminals would be banned in most of Riverhead Town’s industrial areas, under a proposed code amendment unveiled Thursday.

Legislation drafted by town planners and discussed at the Town Board work session would define those uses separately from warehouses and prohibit their development in industrial zones. Warehouses — which would be redefined to a use with “limited trucking activity” — could still be developed.

Logistics centers, last-mile fulfillment centers and truck terminals are critical to e-commerce and other distribution industries, and are considered warehouses under the current town code.

Concerns the impacts of their development, especially the potential for them to bring heavy truck traffic to the town’s roads, drew hundreds of residents to public meetings over the last few years. Residents implored Town Board members to assess the impacts of proposed and future industrial developments in the town’s comprehensive plan update, and demanded a moratorium on industrial building until the plan was completed.

Warehouse development was also a huge issue during last year’s local election, with candidates both Democratic and Republican candidates opposing the development of large warehouses and logistics centers. 

The Town Board, after years of resistance, adopted a six-month long industrial moratorium at the start of this year in a 4-1 vote; the board in a 3-2 vote extended it for another three months in July. Town planners requested the moratorium to give the town time to adopt the updated comprehensive plan and code proposals to implement the plan’s recommendations for industrial development.

That led to today’s proposal. Along with banning those truck-heavy uses, the legislation would overhaul the town’s industrial zoning districts and decrease the allowable density of any new industrial development. 

It would rezone all of the town’s industrial land outside of the Calverton Enterprise Park into one of two districts: the Light Industrial district and a newly created Calverton Industrial district. Industrial lands along the south side of Middle Country Road in Calverton, from Manor Road to Fresh Pond Avenue, would be zoned Calverton Industrial, while all other industrial land in the town would be zoned Light Industrial, with the exception of a few smaller parcels rezoned for other uses. More intensive uses would be permitted in the Calverton Industrial zone than in the Light Industrial zone.

The proposed zoning changes in existing industrial districts in Calverton would reduce the allowable building lot coverage and floor area ratio. That would help control how large a building can be developed on a particular property. The allowable height would, however, be increased from 30 to 35 feet.

Development in the Calverton Industrial district — which includes some large parcels of agricultural lands — would need to comply with larger setbacks and have a larger amount of landscaped area than Light Industrial development. Both districts would have the same floor area ratio requirements and developers in both districts would be able to increase development density with the purchase of preservation credits through the town’s transfer of development rights program. 

Additionally, developments of multiple buildings in the Calverton Industrial district would need to be planned in a campus layout, the legislation says, and no individual building in a campus style development is allowed to exceed 50,000 square feet in size.

The code also includes a table of use regulations, which more clearly defines what uses are and are not allowed in the industrial zones. Currently, uses within the town’s industrial districts are general. Take, for instance, manufacturing, which is an allowed use, but not specific to any particular item or business. The use-regulation table specifies the types of manufacturing facilities that are and are not permitted in the zoning district.

Most of the uses in the table are based on the Standard Industrial Classification manual, which is used by the federal government to classify types of businesses, Senior Planner Matt Charters said. The uses are listed as either prohibited (X), allowed by-right (P) or by special permit (SP). 

The code also proposes amending the zoning of Planned Industrial Park district, the zoning of the industrial core in the Calverton Enterprise Park, to prohibit the uses prohibited in the Calverton Industrial district.

However, not all of the land in EPCAL is under the Planned Industrial Park district; the Planned Development district governs most of the land currently owned by the town at the park and allows “All uses that promote economic development,” with a few exceptions. The land owned by the town at the park is currently the subject of litigation between the town and Calverton Aviation and Technology, which was in contract to buy the land and had unveiled plans to build an air cargo logistics center hub.

Another use prohibited in industrial zones, according to that use schedule, is private or denominational schools. The town considered allowing private schools on industrial land to so  the Riverhead Charter School could purchase land for a new high school campus, but that idea was removed from the comprehensive plan after community backlash. The code allows other schools, including flight schools and vocational schools, Charters said.

The amendments would also affect non-industrial zones. It removes certain minimum and maximum size requirements in the code specific to townhouses in commercial areas, which Charters said made it “impossible” to develop townhouses. It rezones some preserved properties to the town’s Open Space Conservation district; certain properties in residential use within industrial areas to a residential district; and two properties on the north side of Middle Country Road, just west of the intersection of Route 25A, from industrial to hamlet center. Maps of the proposed changes can be found on the town’s website.

While Town Board members had some questions and minor suggestions about the proposal during the work session, they did not voice any objections and were supportive of the changes. 

“It flows so nice now. It’s so much better,” Supervisor Tim Hubbard said of the code proposal.

Correction: This article has been amended to correct a misstatement about the proposed changes to the Planned Industrial Park district. The article previously stated the uses of the district would be the same as the Calverton Industrial district; only the uses prohibited by the CI district would apply to the PIP district, not the permitted uses. It was also amended to correct the vote tally for the industrial moratorium; the moratorium was adopted by the board in a 4-1 vote, not unanimously.