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Downtown comfort station now open

VERA CHINESE PHOTO | Riverhead Town buildings and ground workers hold up toilet paper for a mock a ribbon cutting ceremony outside the town's newly renovated comfort station.

The long-shuttered municipal restrooms on East Main Street in Riverhead are now open for, well, business.

Riverhead Supervisor Sean Walter and the rest of the Town Board,  as well as county Legislator Ed Romaine (R-Center Moriches) and other officials gathered outside the town’s comfort station, which has been closed since 1990, to announce the completed renovations at noon Tuesday.

The station, located near Grangebel Park at the intersection of East Main Street and Griffing Avenue, has two stalls for men and two for women.

The restrooms will be open during parades and other events and members of the adjacent River and Roots community garden will have keys., Mr. Walter said. The comfort station could be open additional hours during the summer, he added. It would close at dusk.

The work was done by town workers at an estimated cost of $35,000, Mr. Walter said. He noted original bids for the project came in at about $110,000, or about $50,000 more than a county grant funding the work.

The county money was then redirected to another project, but Mr. Walter said he must first seek to have those funds reauthorized.

The Business Improvement District had also pledged $5,000 toward reopening the comfort station, according to its president, Ray Pickersgill.

The comfort station was originally donated by the Riverhead Lions Club.

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