What to do with Kings Park

Kings Park and Pilgrim State Psychiatric Hospitals were once gigantic facilities of amazing proportions. At its prime Pilgrim alone held about 19,000 patient-inmates. Both now sit on huge parcels of land on Long Island within reasonable distance of New York City. Many developers have eyes these massive parcels, but no one has been brave enough to actually develop them. This Newsday article discusses the latest attempt to do so:

Kings Park Try No. 3: Will this developer make it work?

Now that a third developer has agreed to try to turn the former Kings Park Psychiatric Center into something more economically beneficial than crumbling old buildings, a word of caution is in order: This developer could very well make the same decision as the previous two - that the economics of the project are way too scary to proceed. If that happens, it will be time for the state and the Town of Smithtown to step back and rethink the whole process.

In order to build anything desirable on this site, a developer would have to invest tens of millions of dollars to clean up the deteriorating buildings above ground and the bones of past buildings below. Then, to recover that investment, the builder would have to persuade Smithtown to allow much greater density than current zoning allows. It would be easier to sip oatmeal through a straw.