Legoland plan clears key hurdle; foes stand firm
GOSHEN, N.Y.» The Planning Board in this Orange County town has advanced the Legoland theme park proposal by accepting developer Merlin Entertainment’s “Final Environmental Impact Statement.”
The board’s 6-1 vote on Thursday came after a public hearing on the proposal, which calls for the park to be built on a 523-acre parcel near Exit 125 of Route 17 in Goshen.
Debra Corr, of the grassroots opposition group Stop Legoland Goshen, said efforts to halt the theme park will continue.
“It’s not over yet,” Corr said. “It’s not a done deal. We have a lot to go, and we have a lot of fight in us, and we’re going to continue to fight ’til we stop Legoland.”
Planning Board Chairman Lee Burgess said despite claims by opponents, the board is not rushing through the review process.
“We are not fast-tracking it,” Burgess said. “This is a normal time frame. The applicant is working with some very good, efficient consultants. They are not unfamiliar with developing a park, and at the same time we have our consultants.”
The use on Thursday of a Planning Board alternate member, due to member Diana Lupinski’s recusal from the voting because of a photo of her wearing a Lego pin, caused some controversy among the Legoland opponents.
Corr said such a major decision should not have been made without all permanent board members of the board present.
Burgess defended the board’s alternates, saying they are highly qualified to vote in the event a regular board member is absent or recuses him/herself.
“We do have alternates ... that have been involved with the project since day one, just because people do take vacations, people do get sick, people have work commitments,” Burgess said. “Being on a board is not a full-time job. It may feel like it sometimes, when you get these reams of papers to study, but it is something that we do have to have backup provisions, and we do have two alternates available to us for any given situation.”
The Goshen Legoland plan was announced in June 2016, and Merlin said the project is expected to cost $500 million.
Merlin expects 2 million visitors per year, with the facility open from April 1 through Halloween. Onethird of the visitors are expected to be tourists, another one-third would be day-trippers and the final third would be local residents.
The Lego company began to look for another site to build the theme park after its first choice, in Haverstraw, was rejected by the Rockland County town.
The next step in the Legoland review process in Goshen is the Planning Board voting on the developer’s “findings statement.” Approval of that would allow the project to move toward site plan approval, which would clear the way for construction to begin.
Merlin hopes to open the theme park in 2019.
There currently are Legoland theme parks in Florida, California and five other countries, as well as 12 indoor Discovery Centers around the world. One of the Discovery Centers is Westchester County.