The historic marina on Lagoon Pond Road in Vineyard Haven, purchased in 2021 by Dallas-based Safe Harbor Marinas, will soon be exchanging buildings for boat racks and gravel surfaces for concrete slabs, if the Tisbury conservation commission approves.

Safe Harbor, a privately-held company with more than 100 marinas, proposes to remove four buildings from the site in order to expand boat storage, according to a presentation to the conservation commission Tuesday afternoon.

Island-based land surveyor and engineer Reid Silva appeared before the board on behalf of Safe Harbor.

Structures to be removed, according to the plans, are three boat sheds that have been used for maintenance and storage or leased to woodworkers, and the raised office building closest to the road.

Mr. Reid could not answer commission member Lillian Robinson’s question about the future of the office building, formerly a Baptist church in North Tisbury and later the boatbuilding shop of Erford W. Burt, who moved it to the three-acre property when he established his boatyard in 1945.

“It’s a building that has been manipulated probably 20 times since 1940-whatever, so it’s not like it’s a nice, cohesive building right now; but I can ask them if they have any place they can reuse it or if they were planning to reuse it,” Mr. Silva said.

“I almost can guarantee they were not, but I can certainly ask that.”

The other three buildings date to 1950, Ms. Robinson said, urging relocation instead of demolition.

“Because of this Islandwide trend of just demolishing structures, and in consideration of the quantity of dumpstered material leaving the Island, I’m just wondering, with this applicant, just if there’s any way to save these buildings and reuse them elsewhere,” she said.

Commission members peppered Mr. Silva with other questions about managing runoff, containing construction debris, managing parking and recycling the plastic used for winter boat covers.

Member John Best challenged Safe Harbor's plan to pour concrete over surfaces that currently are permeable gravel.

“That’s a lot of concrete being added,” Mr. Best said.

The slab is necessary to support boat lift machinery, Mr. Silva said, adding that with the removal of the four buildings, the site’s proportion of concrete coverage will be less than it currently is.

The commission continued the marina hearing to Feb. 1, with conservation agent Jane Varkonda summarizing the outstanding questions for Mr. Silva to pose Safe Harbor:

“We want to know the number of boats currently stored [and] the number of boats projected to be stored, we want to know [how] groundwater discharge into the wetlands and the lagoon can be managed better,” Ms. Varkonda said.

“We want to know if they did any investigation of the soils under the . . . buildings to be removed; and then basically a construction narrative for how all this is all going to take place,” she said.

The commission also asked Mr. Silva to inquire about plastic recycling before the hearing continues Feb. 1.

Mr. Burt, a leading figure in 20th-century boatbuilding on the Island who began his career with the famed Manuel Swartz Roberts of Edgartown, operated his boatyard for nearly 40 years before selling it to Bob Maciel in 1985, after Mr. Maciel had leased the business for two years.

Renaming it Maciel Marine, Mr. Maciel added docks and more storage space for boats, as well as a mooring service.

In 2013, he sold the business to George Rogers and Sheryl Roth Rogers, who changed the name to Martha’s Vineyard Marine.

The Rogers, who raised the office building on pilings the following year to keep it dry from rising Lagoon Pond water levels, also owned the marina at Edgartown’s town-owned North Wharf.

In 2016, they sold both operations to Florida-based Prime Marina, which was acquired by Safe Harbor last year.

Under the new names Safe Harbor Vineyard Haven and Safe Harbor Edgartown, the businesses are two of only three full-service marinas on the Vineyard. The third is the Martha’s Vineyard Shipyard, which is also planning an expansion, although plans are currently on hold, according to the Martha’s Vineyard Commission website.

Following the conservation commission’s review, Mr. Silva said, the proposed reconfiguration in Vineyard Haven will go to the state Department of Environmental Protection, which requires updated plans for businesses licensed under the Massachusetts Public Waterways Act.