An application to subdivide the privately held Montauk Airport on East Lake Drive into four residential lots is making its way through the East Hampton Planning Department and could get an initial airing before the planning board in early July.
The 38-acre parcel is surrounded by over 1,000 acres of town and county parklands, which includes the nearby Big Reed Pond, the site of an aircraft accident that killed three men in 2003.
Eric Schantz, a principal planner with the town, said that because the airport is in a five-acre residential zone, it comes with restrictions. For example, the subdivision would require that at least 50 percent of the property be preserved as open space.
According to the application, received through a Freedom of Information Law request, Montauk Airport Inc. seems amenable to that restriction.
A letter submitted by Leonard Ackerman, a lawyer with Ackerman, Pachman, Brown, Goldstein & Margolin, said the property could yield a fifth buildable lot. “The applicant seeks to forgo the development of the fifth lot and seeks to establish that area as open space.”
The four proposed lots, ranging from 3.2 to 4.8 acres, would account for 16 acres of development, leaving nearly 57 percent, or roughly 21 acres, as reserve.
Mr. Schantz said the planning board will most likely be interested in protecting the wetlands and dunes, and deciding the most appropriate place to create the building lots. Making sure visual impacts are minimized and maintaining a public vista of the nearby dunelands would be paramount.
“They easily have adequate area to meet the minimum distance between lots,” he said. Because the application is for a preliminary subdivision and doesn’t include any building plans, it’s not clear if any variances would be required from the zoning board of appeals. However, the fire marshal will have to ensure the subdivision has access to water as part of its approval.
The town was close to purchasing the airport back in 2021, but because of tax implications affecting the seller, an agreement was never finalized. After those negotiations ended, the airport was sold to a single individual, in June 2022, reportedly a billionaire hedge fund manager.
If the land was successfully subdividtown from purchasing it; however, it could raise the land value. Because the airport took a loan from the Federal Aviation Administration, known as a grant assurance, its use is restricted, and it must continue to operate as an airport until 2027. The airport could not be developed as residential parcels until the grant assurance expires.
East Hampton Town Supervisor Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, through Patrick Derenze, her public information officer, said Tuesday that if the property became available, “The town would be open to exploring all potential options.” The owner, however, did not contact the town to gauge its interest in a possible purchase, she said, before he submitted his subdivision application.
According to the subdivision plans, the four building lots would run in a north-to-south configuration, along what’s currently the airport’s 3,200-footlong runway. That placement keeps them as far as possible from dune crests and other environmentally sensitive features, such as the property’s multitude of wetlands.
“I haven’t yet formed an opinion on it,” Councilman David Lys said in a phone call Friday. “It’s one of the most environmentally sensitive areas in the town. If it gets developed, I’m sure the Planning Department will do everything in their power to protect the dunelands. There could be a ‘king lot’ back there, surrounded by huge wetlands and dune crests.”
Neil Blaney, the Montauk Airport manager, would not share usage statistics or discuss ownership of the airport. “You get your bread-and-butter traffic between Memorial Day and Labor Day. After Colombus Day, it’s quiet,” he allowed, when reached on the phone.
Without usage data, it’s difficult to know what the impact of the airport’s eventual closure could have on the East Hampton Town Airport, currently locked in litigation after the town board sought greater control over its operations to limit its noise impact.
One thing was clear when the town studied the environmental impacts of closing its own airport in early 2024: Traffic at the East Lake Drive landing strip would spike during the summer months if the town’s airport were closed.
“Given the general interest within the town regarding airports and air traffic, generally, we are optimistic that this proposal will be viewed by the planning board, the town board, and the East Hampton community generally as a palatable transformation of the site,” wrote Mr. Ackerman.
