The Glen Cove Waterfront Sound Off

Editor's Note: This is part one of a Patch series. 

"The development of the waterfront has continued to gain momentum . . . our city will have a waterfront to complement the downtown and our existing neighborhoods . . . comments and input from the residential and business communities will become part of the process . . . " 

So go excerpts on the City of Glen Cove's website concerning the redevelopment of the waterfront. However, longtime residents of the city can't help but harbor a healthy degree of skepticism when it comes to plans for the recasting of properties on either side of Glen Cove Creek. 

Few would question the potential for an effective redevelopment plan turning the waterfront into an important asset for the community and the kind of waterside attraction that helps define so many communities on Long Island.  

Nonetheless, city administrations have come and gone, designs have been proposed and rejected, modified, some even accepted. Shovels of symbolic earth have been scooped, even some ribbons cut.

Many residents still feel, however, that history has shown they will be history before anything large scale is accomplished. Granted a number of restaurants, a marina, a boatyard and some other facilities have materialized, but they seem only one-shot occurrences outside of any kind of master plan.   

With the disclosure of the latest design proposal, Patch recently set forth to get some reaction from proprietors at facilities already in place on the waterfront.   

To date, the person whose imprint is most apparent along the waterfront is businessman Joe Weiser. On New Year's Eve of 1996, Weiser bought what he describes as a rundown boatyard along Shore Road and renamed it Jude Thaddeus Marina – perhaps appropriately the patron saint of desperate situations or forgotten causes. Weiser then set about turning the property around. 

"When I bought the marina, it had 125 boats in the water and 215 in winter storage," he explained. "We made all kinds of repairs, put in new bulkheads and built The Hideaway Restaurant. The number of boats then increased to 397 in the water, 1,200 in winter storage. I feel the work we did at the marina was instrumental in winning the Brownfields Award announced by [then] Vice President Al Gore in 1998."  

That federal superfund grant provided for the cleanup of the long defunct Li Tungsten facility's grounds, where heavy metals and radioactive ore residues contaminated the property from the 1940s until 1980, when the company went out of business.   

Weiser credits former city Mayor Tom Suozzi with "a tremendous drive to revitalize the waterfront," which Weiser feels is critical to generating increased business interest in the city.   

"There needs to be a reason for people to come to Glen Cove," he emphasized, "and business people need to see the opportunity to make money on their investments here. I built the Steamboat Landing Restaurant on the waterfront in 1998. Glen Cove never had a popular waterfront restaurant like that before." 

The success of the marina attracted the attention of Georgia-based Vinings Marine Group, which operates similar facilities around the country. VMG eventually made Weiser an offer he couldn't refuse and he sold the marina.    

"Like most long-term residents in Glen Cove, I'm at the 'show me' stage," said Larry Davids, gesturing toward an architect's rendering of some prior plans for the waterfront, on the wall opposite his front desk. Davids manages the Glen Cove Marina for VMG. 

"City administrations come and go, then the next administration always seems to start from the beginning again," he added. "After all that, I don't really look at the plans anymore."  

As a marina operator, what would Davids like to see happen at the waterfront?  

"We need to make Glen Cove a destination for boaters," he explained, "not just a stop to gas up between point A and point B. More new bars and restaurants would do that, to a degree, but patrons at those seldom leave the property.' 

If Davids had his druthers?   

"An aquarium. That would be a perfect attraction for the waterfront," he contended. 

What would a further revitalization of the waterfront do for the restaurants already in place?  

"Of course, I'm hoping the waterfront revitalization will help our business," said Dave Newkirk, proprietor at The Hideaway Restaurant. "It's time to get up to 2010 and allow us to compete with places like Freeport, Long Beach, Bayville, even Montauk."  

Newkirk is another lifelong resident of the area, having grown up in Glen Head, he moved to the city 15 years ago and took over The Hideaway a year-and-a-half ago.   

"All the stuff going on in town is great, but those of us outside of the downtown could really use some of the attention that the revitalization would provide," he said. "I think the mayor, the city council, the county, even past administrations in the city and county have been making great strides for businesses and residents here. There is a lot to see and do in Glen Cove. In the best of all worlds, where plans for the waterfront come to pass, it would have a great impact on my business, even helping while the development itself is taking place." 

For now, Newkirk would be happy with some baby steps, such as allowing restaurants to have live music outside in the warmer months, which he contends would also help enhance the mayor's stated purpose of making the city "the music capital of Long Island."   

"We know you can't have a rock band blasting at 2 in the morning — I rent out a couple of cottages adjacent to the restaurant — but music also attracts patrons to the restaurants in places like the Freeport waterfront and it would work here, too." 

Is he skeptical about the plans ever coming to fruition? 

"The symbolic shovel in the ground at the proposed ferry terminal seems like a good start," Newkirk said.