"Big Box Crossing" is a looming disaster for Commack and Dix Hills. Photos for illustration only -- very similar to, but not actual Commack site.

8-31-06. We have presented voluminous proof that Big Box Crossing has been a fraud and illegal since its inception. We have warned Steve Levy and county officials for more than a year about the dangers of their plans. Today we have been proved right for the second time in less than two weeks since the illegal road construction on the western side of Commack Road started. Unfortunately, two adults and an infant were hospitalized from a 2-car accident on 8/17, and a young man and young woman were hospitalized after tonight's serious 2-car collison at the opening of the new Crooked Hill Road. There was no SEQRA review of this part of the project, and there was no traffic study as required by NYS Highway Law 136. The dangerous and illegal temporary signal pole at North Gate must be removed and the new road must not be allowed to open until legally required studies are done, new plans are approved and new legal permits are issued. Either Suffolk County must do this or Huntington must do this. Hopefully they will work together to protect the public from harm and to protect County and Town taxpayers from the virtually unlimited liability posed by this treacherously under-planned project. WHERE THERE IS NO ENFORCEMENT - THERE IS NO LAW. .

8/21 - Huntington has authority under NYS Vehicle and Traffic Law 1660 to remove the signal poles at both North Gate and Henry Street. Check out this and many other legal citations and files in the Downloadable Files section linked near the bottom of this page.

Call and email Huntington officials to demand that they take action to stop illegal work in the town of Huntington. Huntington should also immediately remove the dangerous temporary signal pole that was illegally installed. (See email addresses and phone numbers near bottom of page.)

Huntington officials have the authority and responsibility to protect residents. They should be enthusiastic about this opportunity which results directly from Suffolk County's attempt to cover up the fact that the BBC project is right on top of residential areas despite the fraudulent misrepresentations and omissions of the developers' Environmental Impact Statement.

SCROLL DOWN TO 8/9 NEWS ITEM "HARD TO BELIEVE" FOR MORE DETAILS, but take note that the Suffolk Legislature does not have the power to vote in illegal maps, authorize fraud, or nullify federal safety regulations. By their vote, the majority of legislators have condoned crimes - and perhaps, they are parties to them. Another in the never-ending examples of rampant corruption in Suffolk County.

As result of Freedom of Information Act letters and hundreds of hours of research, citizens now have the actual documents and legal citations that prove the SEQR-EIS (analysis of environmental impact required by NYS law) was fraudulent as are critical work plans submitted to Suffolk County by the developers. This means that all rezoning, variances, and associated work permits are illegal. FACTS AND DOCUMENTS WILL BE PRESENTED AT THE SUFFOLK COUNTY LEGISLATURE PUBLIC MEETING TUESDAY, AUGUST 8th AT 9:30AM. See news section below for directions and please try to attend.

To see more details, documents and proof of everything stated here, check out the documents, pictures and video on the link for FILES AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD near bottom of this page (scroll down). To hear all the details and to support your community against this illegal and dangerous activity, please attend the SC Legislature meeting on Tuesday 8/8.

A huge public safety hazard was discovered at Commack Road and Henry Street where the SAME developer illegally installed a traffic signal support pole just inches from a 20" 350psi gas distribution pipeline. So far, residents and travelers have been lucky. This is one of the largest gas lines in the region. The huge, continuous high-pressure gas flow of this pipeline could cause a massive explosion and fire if it were damaged in any way, and critical service to many thousands of homes and businesses could be disrupted. This pipeline very literally runs through the rear property of 24 homes in a neighborhood of 228 homes along the busiest section of Commack Road where traffic jams and serious accidents are common.

The developer attempted to repeat this same kind of installation for the new traffic signal proposed to support the new roadway being constructed between Motor Parkway and North Gate. If we don't stop it, this will be the main entrance/exit for BBC. KeySpan project engineers John Asaro and Eldon Smith both stated emphatically that there is "NO WAY" these pole installations can be made safe at the proposed proximity to the the 20" 350psi and 12" 350psi gas mains that run directly through this area. NYS Public Service Commission officials also stated in initial conversations that they could see no way these installations could be made as proposed. Now other officials who may be closely associated with or influenced by the politically powerful developers appear to be trying to skirt federal safety regulations. Worse yet, instead of waiting for indpendent studies that are underway to be completed, SCDPW officials are working for the developers -- aiding, abetting and expediting every aspect of the project. Steve Levy knows this and has refused to take action.

Because Levy and SCDPW are refusing to take action on the existing Henry Street installation, and are doing everything possible to fight residents and help the developers proceed with the new installation, they are exposing local residents and travelers to very real physical danger, and subjecting Suffolk County to potentially massive liability similar to that which has bankrupted other municipalities. This is no longer a local issue. ALL SUFFOLK TAXPAYERS ARE BEING PUT AT TREMENDOUS RISK.

In addition to allowing the fraudulent EIS, defective work plans, illegal work permits and irresponsible public safety violations, SCDPW is also attempting to take private property for the purpose of installing the proposed signal pole. To do this legally would require an eminent domain proceeding. Levy and SCDPW officials don't want the developer to have to wait for this lengthy, unpopular and risky legal action so they are attempting to use a map from 1967 that has never been legally recorded to claim thousands of square feet of property from homeowners along the western side of Commack Road. 8/21 - We believe that thay have now given up on this nefarious plot, but we continue to watch vigilantly.

The work plan submitted by the developers for the new road and traffic signal fails to show that the proposed location for the signal pole is almost directly over the 20" gas pipeline that is clearly marked along the west side of sidewalk on Commack Road. The work plan also shows the pole location outside of the county's right of way on private property. Furthermore, SCDPW's work permit fails to mention the work to be performed on the west side of Commack Road as shown on the developers' submitted plan. SCDPW's work permit specifically states, "On the e/s of CR13, Crooked Hills Rd. n/o Henry St. in the hamlet of Commack, town of Smithtown." The permit itself is defective because it fails to clearly describe work to be performed on the west side of Commack Road in an apparent attempt to cover up that essential parts of this project are in the town of Huntington. Any one of these errors or omissions is sufficient to invalidate the current permit. BASED ON THE COUNTY's OWN WELL ESTABLISHED RULES, PROCEDURES AND PRACTICES, THE ORIGINAL PERMIT #13-447 MUST BE RESCINDED AND A NEW, CORRECTED PLAN MUST BE SUBMITTED BY THE DEVELOPER TO APPLY FOR A NEW PERMIT.

Levy and SCDPW officials have the authority to stop this illegal and dangerous work, but they have refused. They have refused to even postpone work to investigate the facts and to allow a gas line safety sudy that is already under way to be completed. In due time, law enforcement agencies will find out WHY. In the meantime, the work must be stopped to protect the public. NOW IT IS UP TO SUFFOLK COUNTY LEGISLATORS TO USE THE POWER THAT THEY HAVE UNDER EXISTING COUNTY LAWS TO DIRECT SCDPW TO RESCIND WORK PERMIT #13-447 FOR THE NEW ROAD AND THE ASSOCIATED TRAFFIC SIGNAL.

Levy has claimed in writing that stopping the traffic light will not stop BBC from opening. THIS IS NOT TRUE! And Levy has every reason to know it. Smithtown's legally filed covenants and restrictions covering their work permits to the developer specifically state that the new road and associated traffic signal MUST be completed before the property rezoning from Light Industry to Shopping Center Business can become final, and ALSO before the Certificates of Occupancy for the stores can be granted. Smithtown's documents can be downloaded from this site.

If Smithtown votes to change the permit covenants and restrictions, this will constitute a material change that requires the entire project to be resubmitted to the Suffolk County Planning Commission and other agencies. New public notices and hearings must take place and this time residents will not be in the dark. THIS FACT EXPLAINS THE RECENT DESPERATE ACTIONS OF THE DEVELOPERS, SCDPW OFFICIALS AND LEVY HIMSELF WHO HAS THREATENED AND DEFAMED RESIDENTS IN AN EFFORT TO COVER UP HIS ADMINISTRATION'S MALFEASANCE.

SUFFOLK LEGISLATORS HAVE ONLY TWO CHOICES. They can choose to be party to the fraud and lawbreaking by failing to take action or by claiming that they have no authority. OR, they can use the power that they have under the law to direct SCDPW to rescind permit #13-447. There is no acceptable reason for delay. The already known facts and the remaining questions of fact are disturbingly and frighteningly clear. The risks to the public are too great. SUFFOLK LEGISLATORS MUST ACT IMMEDIATELY TO PROTECT BOTH THE LIVES AND TAX DOLLARS OF ALL SUFFOLK COUNTY RESIDENTS.

A resolution being placed before the Legislature on Tuesday to stop the light based on the private property issue contains A CRITICAL FLAW that must not be allowed to stand whether the resolution is approved or not. This resolution attempts to segment the new road from the rest of the project and to reclassify it as a SEQR Type II action. The effect of this classification would be to give a no-review "EZ-Pass" to the road at some future date even if we stop it now. It would be completely illegal under the NY State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) to segment the new road from the rest of the project. All involved parties have acknowledged that this road is an essential component of the BBC project and the law is very clear on segmentation. See the document on "SEGMENTATION" in the downlaodable files section.

Fact - Long Island’s roads are the most dangerous in New York and among the most dangerous in the US. Fact - Commack Road has been acknowledged to be one of Long Island’s most dangerous roads by Suffolk’s own officials. Fact - Commack Road is Suffolk’s busiest local school bus route. Fact - For thousands of families, Commack Road and its intersections are the only access to more than 60 schools, parks, sports fields, and other educational and recreational facilities.

More facts - There has already been one school bus fatality on Commack Road since the first part of Big Box Crossing opened. Accidents on Commack Road corridor increased to 560 in 2004. A number of children were victims of more than one accident that year. The number of school bus and other accidents, and terrifying near misses continues to rise. A lesser, but still important consideration is the loss of productive time for our children suffering longer transit times - not to mention this same effect on commuters.

Now, County officials plan to TRIPLE THE TRAFFIC - and particularly heavy commercial traffic - on Commack Road during the main commutation, school and children’s activity transportation hours. Large contractor vehicles and other early morning business supply buyers are a particular problem at Home Depot and WalMart stores that will be the anchors for this second phase of Big Box Crossing.

The Levy Administration is doing this despite unanimous opposition from the broad community, and fully recognizing that Big Box Crossing provides no social or economic benefit to an area that already has the highest shopping center density per capita on Long Island. The only beneficiaries are the developers and the Suffolk officials who appear to be serving them at taxpayers’ expense.

HOW MANY LIVES IS A SHOPPING CENTER WORTH?

Why did County officials greenlight this project without traffic studies or consideration of traffic and public safety impacts as required by NYS laws and Suffolk County statutes?

Illegal changes being made to Crooked Hill and Commack Roads will force the great majority of all traffic, and especially heavy truck and contractor vehicles, directly onto Commack Road just South of the Motor Pkwy intersection. During peak commutation hours this will gridlock traffic on both sides of the LIE backing up well past the Northern State ramps. Because roads at exits will often be blocked, traffic will back up on the parkways and the LIE itself.

If allowed to be completed, Big Box Crossing will lower property values, damage the environment, gridlock traffic on Commack Road and its intersections, and greatly increase travel time and traffic danger for all residents and especially for our children who must travel Commack Road and its intersections to get to school and sports or leisure activities.

PLEASE SIGN THE ONLINE PETITION ON LINK BELOW and check out news items that follow. We need your email address (completely private and secure) to keep you informed - add info@loomingdisaster.com to your email address book.

Adding a huge Walmart and massive Home Depot to the already existing Costco, Home Depot Expo, Target, Multiplex and other large stores will triple current traffic levels and make Commack Road virtually impassable for local traffic many hours of the day. Note that the two previously separated properties have been joined by an illegal 4-lane road.

WalMart and Home Depot -- with their early opening hours serving hundreds of contractors, and their voracious inventory needs requiring dozens of tractor trailers -- pose a particularly great danger to school buses and to families traveling to and from school and sports activities.

Institute of Traffic Engineers studies on Big Box discount stores indicate that as a result of much shorter and far more frequent visits, a center the size of Big Box Crossing can generate as much traffic as the Smithtown Mall which is served by two major divided highways. Imagine this on Commack Road.

All roads connecting to Commack Road -- Vanderbilt, Daly, Wicks, Hauppauge, New Highway, and roads further north and south -- will be dramatically affected with greatly increased heavy truck, commercial and shopper access traffic. Commack already has the highest percentage of shopping centers per capita in Suffolk County (and top of the scale in entire US). There is no justification for more.

The greatest danger and distress is to our children who will not be able to get to school, after school programs, and sports activities safely and on time. Transportation time for many children will double or more.

Fire and ambulance crews will not be able to respond to emergencies in time. On-call personnel will be greatly delayed trying to reach stationhouses.

Volume and type of traffic from distant neighborhoods will make our community unsafe for our children to go anywhere unattended.

Crime in every area bordered by Commack Road will increase.

Character of all neighborhoods linked to Commack Road will change drastically.

Dozens of school buses serving the Commack School District and others must use Commack Road. Many school bus accidents, one school bus fatality, and a number of serious injuries and dangerous near misses have occurred since traffic has increased to current peak levels which already exceed the capacity for which Commack Road was designed.

Smithtown's own projections show that the tax benefit is just pennies per day per household for Commack schools. How can this be worth our children's safety and security? Suffolk County passed the Fair Share for Healthcare act in recognition of the fact that Big Box stores are economically damaging to the County. Considering all the negatives and tremendous voter opposition, ask yourself why town and County officials have gone so far to greenlight this treacherously underplanned project every step of the way and you will realize why we are demanding investigation by law enforcement officials.

The great majority of hundreds of trucks serving these huge stores day and night, and tens of thousands of commercial and consumer shoppers' vehicles from distant neighborhoods will have to pass under the LIE at the Commack Road overpass. This intersection is already far beyond its capacity at many times of day. The long waits and traffic jams there will become all day, every day problems.

Added connecting streets and traffic lights intended to increase access between Crooked Hill Road and Commack Road will further slow traffic and add more danger points to Commack Road. Henry Street is an example of an already very dangerous intersection where many accidents have occurred.

Some stores in the area will go out of business and space will be unrentable except to undesirable businesses. Check out what happens in other areas when Walmart comes to town (www.sprawl-busters.com and www.walmartwatch.com are sites that provide many examples and background information). If you have friends in Massapequa, ask them about the area around the South Shore Mall where WalMart is located.

Tremendous environmental damage has already been done by the removal of thousands of cubic yards of fine, water-filtering sand and topsoil from this northern extension of the Oakbrush Groundwater Protection Area. WalMart, fined hundreds of times for serious environmental violations, plans to open an auto service center on this site.

From misrepresentations and illegal segmentation in NYS environmental (SEQRA) filings, to violations of NYS highway and General Municipal laws, and County and local statutes as well, the public trust has been breached in allowing this project to go forward. Sign in below to get the proof.

This development will seriously affect our communities' quality of life, property values, and the safety and security of our homes and children. The work will go on until we stop it.

Steve Levy and Suffolk County officials have blatantly misrepresented the County's authority and responsibilities relative to development on County roads and additionally when development is within 500 feet of a town boundary. They have consistently taken the side of the developers and Smithtown against the desires, health, welfare and safety of residents despite being presented with information and legal documentation over a period of eight months. Last year, they even tried a covert action to distract citizens groups. We must now go to the media, County legislators, NYS officials and the law to get justice and action.

These are email addresses for Suffolk legislators -- george.nolan@suffolkcountyny.gov, steven.stern@suffolkcountyny.gov, edward.romaine@suffolkcountyny.gov, jay.schneiderman@suffolkcountyny.gov, kate.browning@suffolkcountyny.gov, caracappa@suffolkcountyny.gov, vivian.viloria-fisher@suffolkcountyny.gov, daniel.losquadro@suffolkcountyny.gov, jack.eddington@suffolkcountyny.gov, william.lindsay@suffolkcountyny.gov, ricardo.montano@suffolkcountyny.gov, cameron.alden@suffolkcountyny.gov, thomas.barraga@suffolkcountyny.gov, john.kennedy@suffolkcountyny.gov, cnowick@suffolkcountyny.gov, wayne.horsely@suffolkcountyny.gov, elie.mystal@suffolkcountyny.gov, lou.damaro@suffolkcountyny.gov, jon.cooper@suffolkcountyny.gov, wayne.horsley@suffolkcountyny.gov. These are the NYS Senators for our area -- Owen H. Johnson - District 04, Carl L. Marcellino - District 05, and John J. Flanagan - District 02. Sen. Flanagan's email contact is odonnell@senate.state.ny.us. The following are email addresses for our area’s NYS Assemblymen -- ramosp@assembly.state.ny.us, fitzpam@assembly.state.ny.us, raiaa@assembly.state.ny.us, contej@assembly.state.ny.us.

These are the NYS Senators for our area -- Owen H. Johnson - District 04, Carl L. Marcellino - District 05, and John J. Flanagan - District 02. Email addresses for Johnson and Marcellino are not yet found. Emails for Sen. Flanagan and for our area’s NYS Assemblymen are -- odonnell@senate.state.ny.us, ramosp@assembly.state.ny.us, fitzpam@assembly.state.ny.us, raiaa@assembly.state.ny.us, contej@assembly.state.ny.us.

Note that in addition to the terrible effects on local communities, this issue puts every Suffolk County taxpayer's money at risk because of the tremendous liability the County may face for accidents resulting from official malfeasance related to this project. This issue also affects all New Yorkers because proper action will help stop similar poorly planned and illegally approved development damaging to dozens of other communities. Our elected officials need to hear how citizens are being victimized by the tremendous political influence of major developers, and they need to know that we expect action.

Don't believe the propaganda and misrepresentations of the law being put out by County officials. There is no liability to developers when enforcing existing law -- particularly when they may have been complicit in skirting legal requirements. It remains worthwhile to contact Steve Levy to demand that he changes his position and instructs the SCDPW and Highway Departments to do their jobs under NYS and County statutes, and stop all construction pending full investigation. Steve Levy (853-4000) at the Suffolk County offices located in the H. Lee Dennison Building, 100 Veterans Memorial Highway, Hauppauge, NY 11788-0099. Email the County Executive at county.executive@suffolkcountyny.gov.

LoomingDisaster.com serves a number of neighborhood associations and civic groups. If you agree that construction of "Big Box Crossing" and other treacherously under-planned development on the Commack Road corridor must be stopped, please sign online petition below. To support critical action required to stop or change these developments, and to force the County and Towns to make necessary roadway modifications to minimize traffic and insure our safety; email, write, call or visit your elected representatives. Demand that they take action to investigate and stop this totally unneccessary, damaging and illegal development. Please get involved.

Email addresses for Huntington officials - just copy and paste into address box: fpetrone@town.huntington.ny.us, mcuthbertson@town.huntington.ny.us, sberland@town.huntington.ny.us, sbesen@town.huntington.ny.us, gjackson@town.huntington.ny.us, townattorney@town.huntington.ny.us, JSuchow@town.huntington.ny.us, clerk@town.huntington.ny.us

You can download more information about the looming disaster here.