Plan advances for hockey rink

The Brookhaven Town Board, on July 18, voted to change the zoning at the former Dowling College campus in Shirley, a necessary step in a developer’s $125 million redevelopment plans that include an indoor ice rink and three warehouse-industrial buildings.

The Hampshire Companies, a developer based in Morristown, N.J., will also renovate the athletic fields at the site, which had been Dowling’s aviation school, and donate the fields and the ice rink to the Town of Brookhaven, part of about 25 acres they will turn over to the town.

Renovated athletic fields and a new hockey rink, which is planned to have two sheets of ice, are welcome news to Sixth District councilwoman Karen Dunne Kesnig, in whose district the complex will be built.

“Many of my constituents have reached out and are excited to have more ball fields for use for children and others in our community,” Dunne Kesnig said in an email. “They are really looking forward to the two ice rinks, which are sorely needed in this area and will help families from having to drive to Hauppauge to the Rinx or Superior Ice Rink in Kings Park to hockey or skating. Anything the town can provide to help occupy our youth is a very positive thing.”

Approving the change of zoning from residential to light industrial is the first step in the development process. The developers need to come back to the board for site-plan approval.

Once all the approvals are in place, it would take about two years to build the ice rink and warehouse buildings, Christopher Badger, senior development manager for The Hampshire Companies, told the Long Island Advance in February.

Hampshire agreed to pay the town $2.2 million in land mitigation fees that the town can use to acquire open space elsewhere. To address traffic concerns raised by residents, the company agreed that the warehouse buildings won’t be used for last-mile deliveries, so the buildings can’t be used for Amazon-type warehouses.

They also agreed that the only access to the site would be from William Floyd Parkway and that traffic won’t be able to use Flower Hill Drive, which had been a concern of residents, Dunne Kesnig said.