A pair of otherwise similar concepts — a brewery deep in Springs and a beer-maker’s restaurant in East Hampton Village — are a study in contrasts.
The Springs Brewery is working on gaining permission for a modest, 12-seat tasting room with brewing in the back just north of the Fort Pond Boulevard intersection, not far from the Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center. At present, the site is occupied by a one-story metal building housing Hampton Auto Collision. In the village, a controversial plan for the Toilsome Farm Restaurant and Brewery is another thing altogether.
Proposals have shifted somewhat, but in a recent iteration, the over-the-top plan is for a 10,000-square-foot project, with seating for nearly 130 patrons. If built, it would arguably be the largest venue within the village. By comparison, the Hedges Inn’s new restaurant, Swifty’s, has about 100 seats and, like the Toilsome Farm Restaurant and Brewery site, is also a mostly residential setting. As with many brewery restaurants popping up alongside the Walmarts and Home Depots around the country, the Toilsome Farm concept will include an eye-catchingly tall, branded silo.
The receptions from neighbors for the two brewery concepts could hardly be more different. In a recent planning board hearing, public sentiment was overwhelmingly positive for the Springs Brewery plan. On Toilsome Lane, a lawsuit greeted the proposal, which includes references to hosting up to 10 “special events” for even more guests each year. People who live in the area around the property rightly doubt the developers’ promises to keep noise to a barely audible minimum. If weddings or concerts were allowed, neighbors fear, the action could get extremely loud and incredibly close, to borrow the title of a 2005 novel and 2011 film.
As put forward by its owners, Lindsay Reichart and Gunnar Burke, the Springs Brewery would be reducing the intensity of the current use of its site as a car service facility. The Toilsome Lane project, if it became reality, would be a massive injection of commercial activity to an already-busy corner. We can think of no persuasive argument in which adding more traffic, noise, and action to East Hampton Village would benefit its actual residents and taxpayers as a whole — nor should it be considered in a vacuum.
Outlined in detail in a pending draft of a comprehensive land-use plan for East Hampton Village, business district redevelopment would be centered on a rough triangle bounded by Railroad Avenue and Gingerbread Lane, at which pinnacle would be the Toilsome Farm Restaurant and Brewery. In an otherwise vague recitation of anodyne, community-oriented goals, the village comprehensive plan goes into exhaustive detail about maximizing commercial and residential building in the area. There is clearly a lot of money to be made on the currently underutilized sites. The thing is, village residents have never been directly asked whether they support these kinds of large-scale changes.