Letters to the Editor: 05.22.97
Long-Term Parking
East Hampton
May 16, 1997
Dear Helen:
Unfortunately, I was the only person affected by the new long-term parking rules for the Lumber Lane lot who was able to attend the recent Thursday morning work session held by the East Hampton Village Board. As someone who was outraged by the village's initial proposal and who emerged from the first hearing more than a little skeptical about the village's thinking and motives, I was startled, during the brief work session, to find my sentiments taking a 180-degree turn.
The village, looking ahead, has provided its taxpayers with long-term parking. The town has not done the same. I have no idea what conversations may or may not have taken place between the Town and Village Boards about long-term parking in the Lumber Lane lot. Certainly the present Town Board is dealing with a situation it inherited, not one it created. Nonetheless, the time has come for the town to create its own long-term parking facilities and be independent of the village's accommodations. How can this be done?
The most civilized approach would be for the town to work out an arrangement with the village whereby the two could share the Lumber Lane lot and Railroad Avenue parking lots under an East Hampton Parking Authority, with the town making proper reimbursement for the village's expenses, past and present. Should the village not be agreeable to this solution, at least the Town Board could tell us what happened when it made such an overture.
Under any circumstances, the town should convert its parking lot in Amagansett to a 14-day lot, thereby providing some long-term parking for its residents. By its own estimate, the Hampton Jitney is carrying twice as many passengers as the Long Island Rail Road to East Hampton, and all town residents who use any of the bus lines could have a no-sticker parking facility in Amagansett, cutting the number of town residents at the Lumber Lane lot by approximately two-thirds.
The most forward thinking of all plans would be for the Town Board, working in conjunction with the Long Island Rail Road, to ask the railroad to build its new platform to the rear of the town parking lot in Amagansett (which is actually nearer to the tracks than the Lumber Lane lot) and to request that all trains stop in Amagansett; to acquire the land between the railroad tracks and the present parking lot in Amagansett; to turn that land into long-term parking and to be prepared to face the 21st century and the improved railroad service that is supposed to be coming to the East End. Whatever the merits of this suggestion, it is certainly more feasible than talk of a railroad stop at the airport, which is miles farther from the tracks and inaccessible to the bus lines because of the low trestles.
Frank Iraggi, an assistant to Thomas Prendergast, president of the L.I.R.R., has stated that if the Town Board wishes to move the Amagansett station and make Amagansett a stop for all trains, it should contact the railroad as soon as possible since once the current platform at Amagansett is raised, the town itself would then have to pay for the new station. If the railroad is contacted now, Mr. Iraggi has certainly implied it would assume the cost.
The bottom line is that town taxpayers should not, at this time, be haranguing or vilifying the Village Board. We should be turning to the Town Board to provide us with our own space, and the Town Board should inform us 1) of what happens when they approach the village about an East Hampton parking association; 2) when they will convert the Amagansett lot to long-term parking; 3) what is happening in conversations with the railroad about making Amagansett a stop for all trains and relocating the station, and 4) what efforts are being made to acquire the land behind the parking lot in Amagansett.
The ball is in the Town Board's court, and I would urge all the people concerned about long-term parking stickers to shift their attention - at least for the present - from the Village Board to writing letters to the Town Board and, if that doesn't produce answers, to attend the Town Board's meetings to obtain further information.
Sincerely,
HARVEY GINSBERG
Global Warming
East Hampton
May 17, 1997
Dear Helen,
Some nights ago, I rode home on the Long Island Rail Road. Never have I sat in a more disgusting, dirty, dilapidated carriage in my life.
At a time when global warming is almost certainly upon us - note the "500-year floods" in the Midwest, and the worst drought in Britain since record keeping began 280 years ago - we continue to pour out carbon dioxide from our exhaust pipes while locked bumper to bumper in unmoving traffic on the Long Island Expressway, doing our bit to add to the problem. At the same time, a perfectly acceptable set of rails reaches our part of the world.
This train could be updated to be the most modern, sleek, fast, reliable, dependable, comfortable train in the country, leaving Penn Station every hour on the hour.
We would all gladly prefer such a comfortable commute where we could read our papers, work on our computers, and drink a little aperitif to calm shattered nerves after a day in Manhattan before we arrive relaxed, ready to greet the beauty and peace of East Hampton.
If we used our collective willpower and our powerful connections, we could shortly establish such a system, thus establishing a precedent for the whole country.
Global warming promises to bring with it unprecedented epidemics of disease and to cause millions of global ecological refugees. Let's do our bit for the world, while making our own lives a lot more comfortable!
HELEN CALDICOTT
Classic American Town
Amagansett
May 19, 1997
To The Editor,
Forty years ago when I first saw it, Amagansett was a real village. It had a grocery store, a drugstore, a school, churches, a Post Office, and other establishments that humans need to survive.
Today it is a ghost town. The grocery store and Post Office moved away many years ago, and the drugstore closed. You can't buy a tube of toothpaste, a quart of milk, a stamp, or even, God forbid, a newspaper in this so-called "village."
Yet the population of the area in general grew fivefold. How can this be?
Amagansett suffered the same fate as tens of thousands of other small towns across America. Highway sprawl, strip malls, and shopping centers sucked the blood and life out of these functional central villages. Well-intentioned zoning laws did not help. Today's laws would not allow the construction of the classic American town.
The recent 300-page study, confusingly titled "The Amagansett Corridor Study," is another example of planning gobbledygook designed to justify the continuing destruction of our quaint little village by legitimizing even more strip malls and commercial sprawl.
Isn't Montauk Highway from Southampton to East Hampton cluttered enough? The answer is simple. Stop building on it. Concentrate all future development around existing towns and villages, where people can walk from store to store. Heaven forbid, don't tear down any historic buildings or build on any of the open spaces on the highway in Amagansett. There is plenty of room around the parking lot to the north of the village for anything anyone wants to put up. Build an access road to Windmill Lane, so there are two commercial streets in the village. Put the stores close together - without lawns in between - like they used to be. Make any future development pedestrian-friendly.
Destroying our historic village and scarring our main highway with strip malls and increased commercial activity (no matter how campuslike they look) is killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. What can these misguided planners be thinking? Have we learned nothing in the last 20 years?
BLAKE FLEETWOOD
Peaceful Kingdom
Springs
May 16, 1997
To The Editor:
It is irresponsible to report, as Russell Drumm did in the May 15 issue of The Star, "If you see a fox in daytime, it's sick." This is a quote from Dr. Dale Tarr, who perhaps knows more about domestic animals than wild ones. There are quite a number of us fox-fanciers around who know otherwise and would be delighted to share our information.
I have foxes - parents and twin youngsters. They are extremely healthy and playful with glossy coats. Their food of preference is hulled sunflowers hearts and they come to breakfast between 7 and 9 a.m., are often seen at lunchtime, and again well before dark. Their den apparently is across the road from me on Old Stone Highway, and they can often be spotted crossing back and forth in full daylight. Are you going to push the public's panic button, making people believe this is a colony of sick wildlife?
As for the Department of Environmental Conservation's Mr. Knox, I have photographs of foxes eating seeds on their platform with my cats five feet away, lying down, and washing themselves. Here it is truly a peaceful kingdom.
Sincerely,
EMILY COBB
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