The Bethlehem Town Board held a special meeting Tuesday, May 29, to approve the finding statement for the proposed 450-acre Vista Technology Park.
The approval is a requirement of the state Environmental Quality Review and is a necessary step before a public hearing on the Vista Park Master Plan can take place. That public hearing is set for June 15.
Supervisor Jack Cunningham said one of the reasons for the May 29 meeting was because of a need for a roundabout to be constructed at the entrance to the proposed site.
The NYSDOT (New York State Department of Transportation) does not have a planned roundabout in that intersection, said Cunningham.
Three roundabouts are currently slated to be built as part of DOT’s Route 85 Slingerlands Bypass project, however a fourth roundabout at the entrance of Vista Park will be built by the developers. The town needs approval from NYSDOT before that fourth roundabout can be built. Pete Van Keuren, NYSDOT region information officer, said excavation work on the new alignment and widening abutments along the Normanskill Bridge is currently taking place.
Construction is moving along faster than we anticipated,` Cunningham said.
Including a new roundabout at the entrance of the Vista Park is something town officials would like to see take place while the Slingerlands Bypass project is under way.
`We hope it can be integrated into the larger job without affecting the timeline on the larger job,` Van Keuren said.
Cunningham said project developers BBL Construction are not saying who could be the first tenant at the new tech park, but he said they are saying the interest is out there.
`My understanding is that when the road is complete, we will have commercial and retail tenants lined up to go there,` Cunningham said.
The first tenants for Vista Park are expected to be announced once the entrance road and bypass construction is complete at the end of 2008.
Vista Park is expected to create thousands of new jobs when complete, with a high percentage of the companies moving in to be technology driven, similar to the proposed Sematech and Advanced Micro Devices projects in other areas of the Capital District.
`The developer of this project has determined that 80 percent of new business will be high tech and office space, and 20 percent only retail,` said Kyle Kotary, town board member.
Kotary said the project timeline fits with when technology-based companies will be ready to locate in the area in 2009 and 2010.
`This project will be a success no matter of Sematech and AMD,` Kotary said.
Vista Park will be Bethlehem’s first mixed economic development district, or MEDD, meaning the development will include residential neighborhoods along with retail and office development.
`This gives us our first test of our MEDD district,` Kotary said.
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