Sound Shore

The New Rochelle City Council will vote on a motion to kick off the study of the new Echo Bay development plan.

It’s one of the motions they’ll vote on at their regular meeting, which starts 7 p.m. in City Hall, 515 North Ave.

The document lays out details of a revised plan that the council agreed to move forward with earlier this month. It calls for 200 to 300 residential apartments and 25,000 to 50,000 square feet of space for stores along East Main Street, among other uses.

The plan for the 10.4-acre site between East Main Street and the bay, now occupied by the city’s public works yard, would also include 4.5 acres of waterfront open space and other public uses, including a walk with a future connection to Five Islands Park and other areas. Among the items that must be studied are a kayak dock and areas for sitting and for activities along Echo bay.

The plan is greatly reduced from original plans hoped for in headier days, before the economy took a dive in 2008. But it is still one of the largest projects around, and its potential for opening the waterfront for people to stroll is rare on Westchester’s Long Island Sound shore to say the least.

Among the items the document calls for studying are:

A building of about 350,000 square feet for residential apartments and the retail space.

About 540 parking spaces, all but 100 of which would be housed in the mixed-use building.

The creation of a new access drive, “Armory Place,” what would be shared by the former naval armory adjoining the site, as well as by the mixed-use building and a public parking area that would be created.

Its purpose is to lay out pieces of the plan that must be studied for how they might impact traffic, the environment and other quality of life aspects.

The study must also look at the effects of the re-use of the main portion of the 1931 armory building. The city is awaiting proposals from developers, cultural organizations and other groups that want to pitch plans for the brick building with a vault ceiling.