"Lighthouse Project" at the Nassau Hub

Gavvy Cravath

Gavvy Cravath

Moderator Emeritus
#1
#1
http://www.lighthouseli.com/

The conversation started over in a "sports talk show" thread. I was wondering what other Long Islanders (and former Long Islanders) thought about it.

I am not a Charles Wang fan by any stretch of the imagination, but this scaled down version makes sense. The thing is, Nassau County politicians drag their feet with everything they touch. This looks more and more like a pipedream than anything else.

Honestly, what was the last major project that got built in Nassau County? I think there is a recycling plant that was built, but what happened before that? I really can't come up with anything.

Gavy
 
billyS

billyS

Reign of Terror
#2
#2
As someone who travels south on the Meadowbrook Parkway everyday at rush hour I see it as a nightmare as presently planned. I know we need a new Coliseum but Wang wants to build a little fucking city on the space. All those fucking people who are going to live there are going to have two choices of venues to travel, Hempstead Turnpike and the Meadowbrook. This is already a huge bottle neck starting around 5:00.
 
M

magicfingersny

#3
#3
maybe he should go in with trump and build em condo's at Jones beach (another useless project from Don the megalomaniac). I think last major project over very long period of time was breaking up roosevelt raceway & parcelling it out to retail investors, which was like doubling the size of Rossevelt field Mall. Oh yeah they put in some housing there, which county health closed down for untreatable mold in buildings making people sick
 
M

magicfingersny

#4
#4
I hadn't looked at the update or listened to the lisping interview. Pipedream for foot dragging between town and county going on for what 7 years already. They also don't seem to have any plans for parking
 
R

RuffToy

#5
#5
Major development projects have been greeted on LI especially Nassau County, with a big NO for many years. There's been a ten year battle at the old Cerro Wire Factory on the service rd of the LIE in Syosset. An upscale mall has been planned and the Town of Oyster Bay along with nearby residents have successfully fought the development for years. TRAFFIC has always been the major issue for development projects on LI. Also the NIMBY factor plays in. Where there's an affluent community where these projects are pending, they have the resources to fight development.

Wang and Scott Rechler had proposed a major development project in Plainview. Hotels, housing, retail, parks etc. on land owned by the county and sitting there virtually abandoned. The entire project was squashed when Wang & Rechler lost there appetite for a fight they knew they couldn't win.

There has to be a balance of growth, quality of life, land protection, residents rights, traffic flow, tax income that seems to have thrown development into an analysis paralysis dilemma. Think about the fighting that took place in various communities when the HOV lane on the LIE was under construction.

Ever try to get a building permit in the Town of Oyster Bay? If one i is not dotted and one t is not crossed......back to the drawing board on your dime.
 
wolf5958

wolf5958

lil Fuzzybear
#6
#6
billyS said:
As someone who travels south on the Meadowbrook Parkway everyday at rush hour I see it as a nightmare as presently planned. I know we need a new Coliseum but Wang wants to build a little fucking city on the space. All those fucking people who are going to live there are going to have two choices of venues to travel, Hempstead Turnpike and the Meadowbrook. This is already a huge bottle neck starting around 5:00.
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I know that area is ruff how about from the end of November till New Years than the Meadowbrook is a parking lot from SS to NS everyday. And state law says they can not do improvements to it. Something about the astetices of the stone bridges and the wooden light poles. They can repave but can't add lanes.
 
Gavvy Cravath

Gavvy Cravath

Moderator Emeritus
#7
#7
Lisp...

magicfingersny said:
I hadn't looked at the update or listened to the lisping interview. Pipedream for foot dragging between town and county going on for what 7 years already. They also don't seem to have any plans for parking
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Call me a racist, but he came here at 9 years old. There is no reason for his Asian lisp. You learn a language before the age of 15, 16, you can (and should) speak that language without an accent.

Now, about parking. There are planned parking garages. As for the traffic, that's the problem. The only thing I heard was double decking Hempstead Turnpike from Merrick Avenue to Hofstra. Other than that, there is no alternative. No way they put a spur of the LIRR there.

Gavy
 
wolf5958

wolf5958

lil Fuzzybear
#9
#9
gavycrav said:
You guys just convinced me that this is not going to happen. And The Brooklyn "Ratner" project isn't going to happen either.

Gavy
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Nor the development of the Calveton Grumman proptry again it all comes down to transportation as the major hold back..
 
M

magicfingersny

#10
#10
I think there is a single or double non-commuter railroad spur already running down stewart avenue on the South Side of Old Counry Road, going east I believe from Franklin Avenue
 
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billyS

billyS

Reign of Terror
#11
#11
magicfingersny said:
I think there is a single or double non-commuter railroad spur already running down stewart avenue on the South Side of Old Counry Road, going east I believe from Franklin Avenue
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Yes you are correct. This is the old 'Circus' Spur. Believe it or not every year around this time (March) when Ringling Brothers would come to the Nassau Coliseum they would have the animals on box cars and they would open this spur which indeed comes off the Hempstead line. As the Hempstead line bends south to approach the Country Life Press station behind what was the Doubleday building (on Franklin Ave as MF stated) the spur continues running east, south and parrellel to Stewart Ave and Ending North of the Coliseum. At one point I worked in a building with a direct view of the spur and my first March there I saw everyone run to the windows proclaiming "the circus is here!'. I was told it actually an annual rite of spring for work to stop and everyone watch the circus go by.
 
billyS

billyS

Reign of Terror
#13
#13
gavycrav said:
You guys just convinced me that this is not going to happen.
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Gavy, If it doesn't happen, unlike the Cerro property this project is going to held up by the politicians rather then NIMBYism. They are fighting over the spoils of the project. The fact that if they build all those condos and shopping that will absolutely paralyze the traffic in the area is of no concern to them.
What I don't like is Wang trying to sell the mixed residential/commercial aspect of the project saying it is the new way to go. To me mixed residential/commercial is not new it is called "a city". So what he is really trying to do is build a little city in the middle of Nassau county, in a spot where most people need to go thru everyday. Not only that but everyone who lives on Long Island moved here because we want to live in the suburbs. We don't need some rich guy who lives in a Mansion on the North Shore who is chauffered around and uses helicopters to tell us what we want.
Yes we need a new Coliseum, but not a little city.
 
Gavvy Cravath

Gavvy Cravath

Moderator Emeritus
#14
#14
The county was short sighted back in the early 80s when they put in the Marriott and the luxury boxes at the NCMC. The lot should have been developed back then. I was doing some research, the old Roosevelt Raceway drew over 50,000 spectators on weekends back inthe 50s and 60s.

What was the traffic like back then? It had to be a horror show...

Gavy
 
Gavvy Cravath

Gavvy Cravath

Moderator Emeritus
#18
#18
By the way, was Sonny getting gunned down at the Loop Parkway actually shot over at the NVMC? Early 70s? I was told to look parts of the old "Maria Regina" high school in the background of that scene.
 
billyS

billyS

Reign of Terror
#20
#20
But if there are less business and less people living in the area then there is less traffic to begin with. Back in the fifties and sixties Roosevelt Field was much smaller and there was no Source Mall. I'm sure there was traffic going in and out of the raceway but that was the main cause. There weren't another 50,000 shoppers on top of it.
 
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