After listening to public input for several months, officials have released final Generic Environmental Impact Statement ( GEIS ) for the location, which includes suggested amendments to the zoning code to create the transit-oriented district.
The GEIS outlines and evaluates “potential impacts associated with the adoption of amendments to the Mount Vernon Zoning code to create the Mount Vernon West form-based zoning district.”
“A defining, and perhaps the most important feature for the future success of the area is the Mount Vernon West Metro-North train station,” officials wrote in the GEIS. “The areas proximity to this feature indicated to the city the sustainability of employing some form of transit-oriented development zoning.
“The city’s desire to encourage high quality development that would integrate mixed-uses into the area suggest that form-based zoning would be yet another appropriate zoning tool to employ.”
According to the GEIS, the proposed form-based zoning is different from traditional zoning “in that it relegates the regulation of use to a position that is ancillary and secondary to form.” It allows for private development to be integrated in the public realm by streamlining the lengthy review process associated with traditional “use-based” zoning.
Mount Vernon officials envision a viable longterm plan to revitalize the city with a transit-oriented development, centered around the Mount Vernon West Metro-North Station. The proposal calls for more than 3,000 new residential units and more than 250,0000-square-feet of retail space.
Among the city officials’ stated goals include positioning Mount Vernon West as a concentrated investment area, strengthening the Mount Vernon Avenue gateway into Yonkers and exploring high-density options through re-zoning and the assembly of vacant buildings and underutilized sites.
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