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Hudson Valley Town Board Approves Plans For $500 Million Legoland New York
By
Jen Chung
Published Oct 22, 2017
Modified Oct 22, 2017
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Jake Dobkin / Gothamist
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By
Jen Chung
Published Oct 22, 2017
Modified Oct 22, 2017
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The company behind the big Legoland amusement parks/shrines to bricks-and-minifigs got approval from a Hudson Valley town board for its half-a-billion dollar plans. However, opponents are still fighting against the measure.
The town board of Goshen voted 6-0 to approve the proposal to bring a Legoland to over 500 acres in Orange County. According to the Times Herald-Record, Goshen Supervisor Douglas Bloomfield believes the park will help "offset escalating costs and declining revenues. Roughly 52 percent of the properties in the Town of Goshen are public lands and therefore not taxable. The Village of Goshen is Orange’s county seat. Merlin Entertainments, Legoland’s developer, had to win zoning changes, upgrading the parcels from residential to commercial and to permit a commercial recreation facility to allow the park to proceed."
Goshen approved about $37 million in tax breaks to Merlin, which said a hotel would also be included in the plan.
Debra Corr, spokesperson for Stop Legoland, previously cited concerns about "noise and air pollution and tremendous traffic congestion," given the estimated 1.8-2.2 million annual visitors, as well as how parkgoers would be "tapping into Goshen’s sewer system, threatening our way of life."
The Times Herald-Record reports that the opponents have filed petitions for a referendum on the sale of 8-acres of the 500+ acre project, but the 8 acres apparently wouldn't have a material effect on the overall plans. Planners also believe that a third of the visitors will be tourists, another third will be day visitors and the rest will be local visitors.
There is a Legoland Discovery Center in Yonkers, but that's just a very small representation of the Legoland experience—the Legoland in Goshen would be a theme park along the lines of Legoland in California and Florida. It's unclear whether Lego will bring Lego House to the U.S.
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hudson valley
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Jen Chung
Jen Chung is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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