Shops at Nanuet: Discussions Continue; Meeting Tonight

The Clarkstown Planning Board and other Clarkstown officials continued discussions with Simon Property Group, Inc. on the transformation of the Nanuet Mall into ‘The Shops at Nanuet’ at a Planning Board meeting Wednesday night at Clarkstown Town Hall.

Representatives that spoke about The Shops at Nanuet:

• Chuck Schneider, senior civil engineer for Simon
• Ira Emanuel of the Law Office of Ira M. Emanuel, P.C. in New City
• Sam Fattah, vice president of project management for Simon

Clarkstown Consultants present who are working on the plans with Simon are

• Jose C. Simoes- Town Planner
• James Creighton - Assistant Town Planner
• Charles Maneri - Clarkstown Building Plans Examiner
• Dennis Letson, Clarkstown - Deputy Director of Environmental Control
• Daniel Kraushaar – Deputy Town Attorney

Simon plans to change the Nanuet Mall into The Shops at Nanuet, an open air Main Street concept. “We’re trying to replicate a downtown experience … in a contained space,” said Schneider.

Read more about these changes in this detailing the October informational meeting. Read the first and second articles on the Jan. 18 meeting here, which discussed ways to fix and .

Simon presented to the Planning Board a matrix that goes through all the comments received from Clarkstown’s consultants and outside agencies such as the Nanuet Fire Department and Clarkstown Police Department.

Macy’s

“We’ve approached Macy’s for certain improvements to their façade,” said Schneider, adding that they are not completely on board with certain exterior upgrades.

The Board asked if Simon had any influence or say in changing the appearance of Macy’s.

“It’s their building on their land,” said Schneider.

“It’s like (McDonald’s) on that Stop and Shop property” said Shirley J. Thormann, chairperson of the Planning Board. “How much (influence) do we have with Macy’s? They were a party to this application. Could we request from corporate that they consider making these improvements? These are reasonable requests.”

“They consent by virtue of signing the application to submit themselves to the judgement of this board,” said Krausher.

The Board agreed that a letter will be written to Macy’s requesting these upgrades.

Another Question

“Do the shops have entrances on both sides?” asked Gilbert J. Heim, Jr., Planning Board member, referring to shops along the Main Street and whether they have entrances from both Main Street and the larger parking lots.

“These corner tenants have corner entries … but the other shops do not have rear entries,” said Schneider, adding that the back of the shops—the sides facing into the large parking lots—have their service entry on that side.

Coming Up

"We're going to have to get together and create a resolution for the overrides," said Simoes, adding that the board will meet the following Wednesday for more discussion and to vote on the resolution.

Their next discussion is at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Jan. 25 at Town Hall

To read more details about the plans for the Shops at Nanuet, check out this four-part series from October 2011: