The future of Farmingdale's Allen Park, a triangular Long Island parcel of fine playing fields, a supermarket and a Superfund site, became the focus of the Town of Oyster Bay this week.

With rumors swirling in the community about its future, members of Farmingdale Aquatics cancelled their Tuesday practice to descend on the board en masse. What resulted was a lively discussion about the various options for the undeveloped portion of the town land, located adjacent to the popular community playground.

Bill Manton, head coach of the swim club, argued for the town to build an Olympic-size, indoor pool facility on the undeveloped portion of the town's land. The team has developed many top-notch swimmers over the years from the community, Manton said, by working 11 months a year, six days a week and attending 8-10 competitions a year.

Manton and others expressed concern about an unsubstantiated report that the town was considering a plan to help renovate the Farmingdale High School pool. Manton's team now practices there, and any long-term renovations at the high school would "probably put us out of business for good," Manton said.

Swim team members need nearly year-round conditioning to remain competitive, he said, and other Long Island facilities aren't an option. A parade of swim team members followed Manton to the podium to plead their case for a new, town-owned state-of-the-art pool.

Oyster Bay Town Supervisor John Venditto responded that there are no specific plans for the Allen Park property: "It’s purely speculative," he said. "Everything is on the table. When we acquired the land adjacent to Allen Park the land belongs to the residents. There has been a hue and cry to put a pool there and we're inclined to consider that."

Later, Manton estimated such a facility would cost $20 million.

The triangular site defined by Motor Avenue, Fulton Street and Heisser Lane, now home to a football field, softball fields and handball courts, has had a checkered history:

In 1940, Liberty Aircraft Products Company occupied the site, producing aircraft parts and metal finishing work during World War II and the Korean War. During WWII, federal wartime agencies took ownership of some of the facilities there, according to a report on the site issued by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

After the war, the site was converted to an industrial park and, later, to light industrial and warehouse uses, according to the EPA report.

Liberty and other companies left behind a toxic legacy: a groundwater plume contaminated with organic and inorganic substances lies beneath the 30-acre industrial area and extends about a mile to the south, according to the EPA. Portions of the Massapequa Preserve, a nature preserve located about one-half mile to the south, are also contaminated from the old plant, according to the EPA.

The property was deemed a federal "Superfund" site, a designation that provides federal money to clean-up or contain the contaminated area and prevent it's further spread. Two decades ago the area was designated a national priority for the EPA, which assumed the role of lead agency in documenting the extent of the contamination and determining the best remediation plan.

Ultimately, the EPA was developing a remedial plan which would clean up the property only to commercial/industrial standards, limiting cleanup efforts to full removal of only some areas of contamination and capping others. This changed when the town announced its intention of acquiring portions of the property, the report says.

Today, the eastern-most parcel of the property is home to a Stop & Shop Supermarket and the remaining 22 acres are town property. An extensive cleanup is nearing completion at an estimated cost of $32 million. An additional phase of cleanup and monitoring will continue for some time, the report states.

Officials said the Town of Oyster Bay, which is protected from any future litigation by the EPA agreements, will host community meetings later this year about the park's future expansion.

But village officials are moving aggressively to turn the business district around through a variety of initiatives, largely funded by grants.

The first steps have been small, but noticeable.

Farmingdale has recently replaced cracked sidewalks, installed antique-style energy-saving streetlights, solved drainage problems and started renovating more than 20 Main Street business façades. The village green will soon get a makeover, and a Hilton extended-stay hotel and adjacent park are planned near the Long Island Rail Road station.

"We have been dying a slow death for the last 20 or 30 years and it's time to change -- with public input," Mayor George Starkie said. "We don't have a vibrant business district and not enough people on foot. We don't have housing for our young people."

Farmingdale Chamber of Commerce President Debbie Poldolski supports creating a combination of commercial and residential space.

"To have mixed-use development there would be phenomenal . . . so people would be able to walk around the train station and Main Street area and find everything they need without owning a car," she said.

But the village vision for downtown has raised questions about density, building height, traffic and parking. "I'm seeing terrible traffic," resident JoAnn Russo told the board at a hearing on the hotel last Monday.

Starkie told her the village is planning to add left-turn lanes on Main Street to address traffic concerns.

Lorraine Pieloch, a 45-year resident shopping on Main Street recently, supported the plan. "The village needs a revival," she said. "A lot of the things they are doing are paid for by grants, which is good news for the taxpayers. New merchants are coming in and some of them are hanging new signs, so it's looking better."

Starkie said the project began to take shape in 2006 with a "visioning process" for 60 acres downtown conducted by Eric Alexander of the planning group Vision Long Island. Since then the village obtained grants to revise its master plan from the late 1980s and update the village code to, among other things, again allow people to live above stores.

Starkie expects to hold a hearing this summer on the changes.