{"id":78887,"date":"2025-12-23T08:03:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-23T08:03:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/78887\/"},"modified":"2025-12-23T08:03:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-23T08:03:07","slug":"heatherwood-wins-bid-for-500-unit-east-farmingdale-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/78887\/","title":{"rendered":"Heatherwood wins bid for 500-unit East Farmingdale project"},"content":{"rendered":"

THE BLUEPRINT:\n<\/p>\n

Heatherwood Communities<\/a> selected by New York State for major housing project<\/p>\n

Nearly 500 apartments planned, including studios, townhomes, and three-bedroom units\n<\/p>\n

Development includes parking garage, amenities, walking trail, and \u201cAirplane Park\u201d\n<\/p>\n

Long-vacant Republic Airport<\/a> site may receive environmental remediation support<\/p>\n

Commack-based Heatherwood Communities was selected by the state to build\u00a0nearly 500\u00a0apartments on a long-vacant East Farmingdale<\/a> site.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

The developer, which answered the request for proposals issued in May 2024, plans to build\u00a0a mix of studio, one-, two-, and three-bedroom apartments, as well as townhouse units, in buildings up to five stories. The project includes 630 parking spaces, with a covered garage, both indoor and outdoor amenity spaces, a landscaped walking trail, and an \u201cAirplane Park\u201d public open space honoring the site\u2019s aviation history, according to a statement from Gov. Kathy Hochul\u2019s office.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\u201cHeatherwood is excited to partner with the governor\u2018s office, the State of\u00a0New York and the Town of Babylon on this generational development opportunity,\u201d Chris Capece, Heatherwood president, said in the statement. \u201cTo reposition a blighted and underutilized site that\u2019s laid fallow for decades, for high-quality multifamily housing in the 110 corridor, which holds Long Island\u2019s highest concentration of jobs with adjacent retail<\/a> uses, is a unique opportunity for us as Long Islanders. As Heatherwood continues to grow its footprint nationally,\u00a0we\u2019re\u00a0proud to invest locally to make our home region a better place.\u201d\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

Sean Sallie, Heatherwood\u2019s senior director of planning and development, told LIBN the company is ready to go. \u201cIt\u2019s a multi-tiered process with the state, the Federal Aviation Agency and the town,\u201d Sallie said. \u201cWe have tasks ahead of us, but we\u2019re confident we\u2019re going to deliver for the state and the town.\u201d\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

Currently owned by the New York State Department of Transportation as part of Republic Airport, the site along Conklin Street has been the subject of several past proposals for development.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

Some remediation may be needed on site for potential subsurface environmental contamination, which will be supported by an up to $4 million Department of Housing and Urban Development grant to the Town of Babylon,\u00a0as LIBN previously reported.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

The narrow strip of\u00a0land\u00a0once owned by Fairchild\u00a0Republic\u00a0stretches east from Route 110 to New Highway and has gone from aviation hub to industrial ghost town. On the south side of Conklin Street is the 56-acre Airport Plaza, a 450,000-square-foot\u00a0retail\u00a0center near the main Fairchild Republic\u00a0aircraft\u00a0plant. But since Fairchild closed operations in 1987, nothing has been taking off on the abandoned site.\u00a0\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

In 1927, the Ranger Aircraft Engine Corp. was the first aviation firm to\u00a0locate\u00a0on the northern strip of the Fairchild property, where it constructed manufacturing and test facilities for\u00a0aircraft\u00a0engines.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

Republic Aviation Corp.\u00a0purchased\u00a0the property in 1955 and used the existing facilities for research and development and office space. The Farmingdale Co. owned the property from 1965 to 1972, when Fairchild Industries\u00a0purchased\u00a0it and used it as warehouse and office space. It closed in 1987, according to the state Department of Environmental Conservation.\u00a0\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

Save for a small right-of-way controlled by the Long Island\u00a0Rail Road, which borders the site on the\u00a0north,\u00a0the parcel is now owned by the DOT. Over the years, ideas for redevelopment \u2013 more retail, a train station, housing \u2013 have come mostly from local politicians, businesses and the site\u2019s largest neighbor, Republic Airport.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\u201cFor far too long, this state-owned property has\u00a0sat\u00a0vacant and underutilized, holding back the potential of an entire community. All New Yorkers deserve the opportunity to have a quality, affordable place to call home,\u201d\u00a0Governor Hochul said in the statement.\u00a0\u201cBy leveraging state-owned land and partnering with experienced local developers, we are turning our historic housing commitments into reality and building a more affordable New York in communities across the state, including on Long Island.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"THE BLUEPRINT: Heatherwood Communities selected by New York State for major housing project Nearly 500 apartments planned, including…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":78888,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[433,39188,39189,39190,39191,39192,9,11,10,49,51,39193,50,39194],"class_list":["post-78887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-affordable-housing","tag-apartment-development","tag-babylon-development","tag-east-farmingdale","tag-heatherwood-communities","tag-long-island-housing","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-new-york-state","tag-new-york-state-headlines","tag-new-york-state-housing","tag-new-york-state-news","tag-republic-airport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78887\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}