Coliseum Area to Receive Makeover
Nassau News Staff Writer
Nassau County has taken the first steps to transform Long Island to a tourist attraction, rather than a place from where Manhattan workers commute.
The Nassau Veterans’ Memorial Coliseum, the second oldest arena in the NHL, will be getting a much-needed facelift in what is being called the Lighthouse Project, which is a plan to redevelop the Coliseum and the surrounding area.
The $2 billion project will renovate the Nassau Coliseum and the 77 acres that surround it. The project is being headed by Charles Wang, founder of the Lighthouse project and owner of the New York Islanders and the New York Dragons Arena Football team, and RexCorp Realty, Long Island’s largest developer of commercial real estate.
The newly created Lighthouse is expected to bring in a plethora of new opportunities for residents of Long Island, including jobs and housing. In addition to a newly renovated Coliseum, the Lighthouse will also feature a separate sports complex, technology complex, housing options, conference center, town square, and a five star hotel.
The site is expected to offer more than 2,300 housing facilities with multiple housing types. While that may sound good, some residents are concerned with the already crowded Nassau County. “I don’t know how everyone is going to be able to get around, this place is already crowded enough as it is,” said Chris Clyne, who has been living in the area for the past three years.
All the new residents means more traffic; the Hempstead Turnpike and Meadowbrook Parkway are one of the more congested roads in Long Island. RexCorp has offered to provide more than 17,000 parking spots.
Matt Rimi, a resident of nearby Wantagh, wonders how the town of Hempstead is going to be able to handle all the new traffic. “I go to Hofstra and the traffic on Hempstead Turnpike is already bad enough, I feel like whenever I go home it will take two hours after all the new people are here.” Rimi said.
Bringing in even more people to the already crowded area will be the new Grand Hotel, the first ever five star hotel on Long Island, replacing the Marriot. It is expected to bring in more customers than the Marriot.
What hasn’t been addressed by the Lighthouse project is the effect it will have on neighboring Hofstra University. Many students, especially commuters which Hofstra has a lot of, have been complaining about the lack of reasonable parking on campus. “Parking is regulated so poorly on this campus, I wonder if all these new people this thing is supposed to bring in will start taking away the few spots we still have,” said Wes Hanas, a current Hofstra student and resident of Uniondale.
Another question posed by University students is if a portion of the new housing facilities will be made available to Hofstra students. With the construction of the new graduate dorm nearly completed, the University is in talks with the town of Hempstead about possibly selling the Twin Oaks apartment complex, which is used by many upperclassmen students. “I hope the school is looking into renting some of those places, they keep accepting more students every year and eventually they won’t have a place to put them,” said Nick Shakra, a Hofstra student.
“I know the New Yorker Hotel in Manhattan rents out their rooms to students of the New York Film Academy, so maybe we can do something like that,” Shakra added.
The Lighthouse project plans for the redevelopment to be complete by 2012, so it would have little effect on the current student body at Hofstra, but some are still concerned about the future students. “I plan to live here after I graduate and rent out houses to future Hofstra students,” Hanas said.
All of these new features will transform a relatively poor Hempstead area into a more upper class center, leaving some to wonder what the effect will be on the current residents. The Lighthouse project plans to drive revenue costs through the roof. “A lot of the people that have been here for awhile are not going to be able to afford to live here anymore, so where does that leave them?” said Mike Lawson, a resident of Uniondale.
Members of the Lighthouse Development committee argue that the project will improve the quality of life for everyone around it. The renovation of the Coliseum is also Long Island’s last attempt to keep the Islanders in Nassau County and possibly land a professional basketball team.
The Lighthouse project describes its plan as the “detachment from Long Island’s dependency on New York City.” After it is finished, it looks as if New York City will have some competition for tourists.
Read this reporter's production memo.
Related Links
- This multimedia article was reported as a final individual project for JRNL 80, Online Journalism, Section B, Fall 2007, Professor: Mo Krochmal, Hofstra University (e-mail: maurice.krochmal at hofstra.edu).
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