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General News: Builder Works on Newburgh, Cornwall Projects
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| The 1909 train station as it appeared on a postcard. |
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| The interior of the train station has been completely gutted. |
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| These two homes will be fixed up and re-sold as part of Yannone's proposal in front of the Cornwall planning board. |
April 20, 2009
At least one local businessman is seeing a glimmer of hope in the gloomy clouds hanging over the construction business.
Contractor Ray Yannone, who owns Storm King Contracting, has several projects in the works, including one in Cornwall that involves three buildings on Academy Avenue currently owned by the New York Military Academy. He has also embarked on an ambitious plan to restore the 1909 train station along the waterfront in Newburgh, where he grew up.
Yannone says that he is optimistic about construction now, in part because he and other builders can take advantage of extremely low interest rates as well as low material and labor costs. “Loans are cheaper than I have ever seen them in my lifetime,” he said in a phone interview. “and I’m seeing a lot of activity that I haven’t seen in months.”
Yannone is planning to finance the restoration of the train station, which he was finally able to buy this past January after several years of negotiations with the former owners. The station, which was once filled with marble from floor to ceiling, has been completed stripped in the interior. It was boarded up in 1959 shortly after the passenger train stopped running and, since then, the interior it has been stripped and burned.
Yannone says that the building is symbolic of what happened to Newburgh over the last fifty years and its restoration can be considered part of a revival of the city, similar to the new businesses that are opening on Liberty Street. “This building is something I have admired for years and if it had ended up a pile of bricks it would have been catastrophic,” Yannone said.
He is working with Newburgh architect Roger Wood to restore the brick station. He plans to re-tile the roof with a red composite tile and restore the scroll work on the facade. His long-term vision calls for the station to become an art gallery and office space, a centerpiece of the evolving restoration of the heart of Newburgh.
In Cornwall, Yannone has signed a contract to purchase two houses on Academy Avenue that are currently owned by NYMA. He has a proposal in front of the town planning board to build two additional houses on 2.3 acres that include land behind the current structures. If the approval goes through, he will fix up the existing buildings on Academy Avenue for re-sale. The stone building, known as Donaldson Lodge, will remain with NYMA for its school functions, Yannone said.
Yannone is also the owner of the Storm King Theatre in Cornwall-on-Hudson, a building he restored a decade ago. He says plans to put a theatre back in that building are on hold.
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