Riverhead officials meet with Federal Aviation Administration to pitch EPCAL for new air traffic control facility

The Calverton Enterprise Park is in the running as a potential site for the FAA's new $225 million integrated control facility.

FAA officials visited the EPCAL site yesterday and met with Councilwoman Jodi Giglio and Supervisor Sean Walter.

Both Giglio and Walter would say very little about the outcome of the meeting, other than to say they were pleased with how it went.

"The meeting went extremely well and EPCAL is a viable candidate for the FAA's next-generation satellite-controlled air traffic control facility," Walter said in a phone interview last night.

"It went well, better than well," an elated Giglio said.

The councilwoman and supervisor initially disagreed over whether to pitch EPCAL to the federal government, with the supervisor being reluctant to compete with the Town of Islip for the new facility. In January, he said loss of the air traffic control facility would be potentially devastating to MacArthur Airport, which is owned and operated by Islip Town. The airport, he said then, is a "significant benefit to all Long Island residents and businesses." Individual towns need to "start thinking like a region," he said.

After some discussion, the board agreed to tell the FAA Riverhead was interested in the facility.

Dubbed the Liberty Integrated Control Facility, it would replace existing a terminal radar approach control facilities, known as TRACONs, within the New York Enroute Air Traffic Control Center’s airspace, as well as the N.Y. Enroute Center's under-30,000 feet operations, into one 250,000-square-foot facility. It would be able to accommodate up to 1,200 workers. It would be the first such facility built by the Federal Aviation Administration under its plan to consolidate existing air traffic control facilities in the northeast corridor.

The Long Island congressional delegation is fighting to have the new facility located on the island, currently home to the N.Y. Enroute Center in Ronkonkoma and the NY TRACON in Westbury. Siting the facility off the island would mean the loss hundreds of L.I. jobs.

The FAA had advertised for proposals and reportedly has had several other responses from other municipalities and private property owners across Long Island.

Riverhead Town owns several hundred acres of developable land at the EPCAL site, former home to a U.S. Navy military aircraft manufacturing and test site operated by the Northrop Grumman Corporation. The town, which sold off the existing industrial buildings and some acreage to developers, donated land to the state for a business incubator and is developing some acreage with recreational facilities, is pursuing an mixed-use commercial subdivision of the rest of its land at the site.

Source:   http://www.riverheadlocal.com