Billions in development could reshape Long Island. Who stands to benefit?

The squat office buildings surrounding Maxess Road in Melville are emblematic of Long Island’s past: They have held some of the Island’s largest public companies, major industrial suppliers and even divisions of Northrop Grumman. But local officials hope to transform a few of those properties into a vision of Long Island’s future: new apartments and condos near a proposed hospital complex.

Anthony Cacciato, a 22-year-old Huntington resident and law student, hopes those new homes will give younger Long Islanders more options to stay on the Island amid a competitive housing market.

"It means that I have the ability to really build a life for myself on Long Island in the community that I grew up in ... to see the friends that I grew up with here stick around," said Cacciato, who lives with his parents and spoke in support of one of Melville’s proposed housing developments in August.

Developers and national corporations are planning to invest billions of dollars to redevelop properties across Long Island to meet the needs of growing industries, such as healthcare and logistics. Academics, developers and business leaders told Newsday that Long Island’s popularity, economy and unique geography are driving development: People want to live on Long Island, which increases demand for housing, and companies want to be located in the region to reach customers across the Northeast.

Newsday created a map of 20 major projects that could change Long Island’s landscape. About half still need local approvals and don’t have price tags yet, but the 12 for which developers have estimated costs represent more than $7 billion in planned investment on Long Island.

These projects — among them NYU Langone’s planned Melville hospital and Brookhaven National Laboratory’s roughly $3 billion electron-ion collider — are expected to create thousands of jobs for the Long Islanders who would build them or eventually work in them. They could also give Long Islanders more places to live amid a housing crunch: If all were approved and built as proposed, nine residential developments would bring nearly 6,000 new homes to Long Island.

These developments come as suburbs nationally are evolving to offer denser housing, rely less on cars and bolster infrastructure to withstand climate risks, said June Williamson, a professor of architecture at the Spitzer School of Architecture at the City College of New York.

"Retrofitting, redevelopment — the kinds of things that we've long associated with center cities, this kind of creative destruction and remaking of places as needs change — we're seeing that more and more in suburbs," Williamson said.

But to build new housing, healthcare facilities and warehouses, developers must navigate the region’s permitting processes, restrictive zoning, high land prices and a lack of infrastructure in eastern Long Island — not to mention opposition from residents worried about traffic, the environment and Long Island’s suburban character.

While Cacciato shares some of those concerns, he said he hopes that development will address a greater threat: that Long Island will become increasingly unaffordable for young Long Islanders.

"At the end of the day, our community isn't the type of homes that we build," Cacciato said. "Our communities are people, and we're losing too many of those people to other parts of the country because they can't afford to stay here. I think that's a real and serious problem that needs to be addressed."

Why developers are betting billions on Long Island 

Thousands of homes have been proposed across Long Island amid high demand for housing. At the same time, real estate developers and private companies have looked to build new warehouses, healthcare facilities and revamp the Island’s malls.

In Central Islip, a 96-unit apartment building reserved for lower-income renters is under construction as part of the hamlet’s efforts to revitalize its downtown. Near the Ronkonkoma train station, Tritec’s $1.2 billion Station Yards project is expected to bring up to 1,450 apartments, plus office and retail space. In Mineola, a new 101-unit luxury condominium development is expected to offer units priced at up to $2 million when it opens in 2029, Newsday reported.

Demand to live on Long Island — because of the region’s schools, work opportunities or proximity to New York City — is driving housing development, said Jerrod Delaine, a New York City-based real estate developer and adjunct assistant professor at New York University.

Developers "know it's going to be profitable because [they] know there's an unmet demand, both for rentals and home ownership," Delaine said.

Public dollars have also encouraged new housing development. So far, nine communities on Long Island have won $10 million grants through the state's Downtown Revitalization Initiative, money that’s used to encourage new housing, transportation and other community projects, according to the program.

"New York State has wanted us, and keeps wanting us, to build more multifamily housing," said David Pennetta, an executive managing director at the commercial real estate brokerage Cushman & Wakefield and a member of the Town of Huntington planning board. "They've been trying desperately for decades to get us to do it, and Long Island has been very resistant to doing it."

Long Island’s geography and economy are also driving commercial real estate investment.

The Island, located near New York City and other major Northeastern metropolitan areas, has attracted companies looking to serve customers throughout the region. Trader Joe’s, Home Depot and Amazon are all planning or building distribution centers or warehouses on Long Island, and Amazon has already opened at least eight warehouses, Newsday reported.

"It comes down to this: Do you want your delivery tomorrow, or do you want it the old way, 10 days from now? That's what's changed," Pennetta said. "That's why all these logistics centers are here."

Healthcare and social assistance has become a major employer of Long Islanders and driver of the region’s economy. The sector reached a record 277,200 jobs on Long Island in September. Okoye Davis, a public information officer for the state Department of Labor, told Newsday in an email.

"The healthcare and social assistance sector saw the greatest job growth in the last 20 years," Davis wrote.

That growth has spilled over into Long Island’s malls and retail spaces, with medical tenants taking space formerly occupied by retailers, said Melissa Naeder, a senior director at Cushman & Wakefield. Stony Brook Medicine opened primary and specialty care offices in 60,000 square feet that once belonged to Sears at Smith Haven Mall in 2023, and NYU Langone opened a new ambulatory care center at a former Sears in Garden City a year later.

NYU Langone also plans to build Long Island’s first new hospital in decades. The hospital, which would cover more than 1 million square feet at 1 and 2 Huntington Quadrangle, still needs to secure permits from the Town of Huntington and approvals from the state.

If built, the hospital and academic center could reshape Melville’s economy. NYU Langone estimates the development would create 8,000 temporary construction jobs and 2,500 indirect jobs associated with construction and hospital operations.

"There's people on the hospital front that are designing, trying to navigate the entitlement system, trying to plan what they're doing. You've got attorneys working on it. ... Then there's going to be permanent employees after it's built," Pennetta said.

Who benefits — and who pays — as Long Island changes?

But before many of these projects can break ground, developers must navigate Long Island’s public review process and address concerns from residents about the costs and consequences of development.

The majority of Long Island’s land is zoned for single-family homes, limiting space for multifamily housing, said Mike Florio, the CEO of the Melville-based trade group the Long Island Builders Institute. From 2010 to 2020, the total number of housing units on Long Island only increased by about 1.7% from 1.038 million to 1.056 million, according to U.S. Census Bureau data.

The high price of land, a slow approvals process and a lack of infrastructure such as sewers in eastern Long Island also slow construction, Florio said. Opposition from residents can also block projects because nearly every project relies on local approvals, he added.

In Holbrook, residents have sought to block Amazon’s planned $1 billion fulfillment complex over concerns that the development, which would be 21 times bigger than Amazon’s facility in Syosset, would worsen traffic and harm the environment.

"The wildlife losing their habitat is absolutely heartbreaking," said Stephanie Volpe, 55, who lives in the Parkland neighborhood and helped organize a campaign against the development.

Amazon estimates the facility would employ about 1,000 full-time workers. Amazon spokesperson Austin Stowe said Amazon welcomes community input and noted the facility would "bring significant new tax revenue" to local services.

But Sayville resident Edward O’Donnell, 66, questioned the tax benefit the community would see, given that Amazon plans to apply for tax breaks. 

"Amazon is a $3 trillion capitalized organization," O’Donnell told Newsday. "Why are they asking for tax abatements?"

Long Islanders and government watchdog groups have criticized local industrial development agencies for giving tax breaks to developers, arguing that the breaks can reduce funding for schools. Developers, meanwhile, argue that tax incentives are necessary to create new jobs because of the high cost of building on Long Island.

In Melville, NYU Langone’s planned hospital could reduce property tax revenue because nonprofit hospitals generally qualify for property tax exemptions, Newsday reported. The two Huntington Quadrangle properties currently generate over $2 million annually in property taxes, according to Town of Huntington tax records.

But Huntington Supervisor Ed Smyth argued that the benefit of a new medical center is worth the trade-off.

"There may be some negative impacts, whether it's traffic or whether it's reduced taxes to schools," Smyth said, adding that he’d work to mitigate those impacts. "But from an overall view of this medical campus on Long Island, the benefits vastly outweigh whatever negative impact there is."

Building new condos in Melville has a clear benefit as well, Smyth argued, by offering younger Long Islanders a chance to buy property if they can’t afford a single-family home.

The median home price in Nassau and Suffolk was more than $700,000 in September. Median monthly rents exceed $2,000 in both counties, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. Even some income-restricted apartments can have high rents, as state law allows developers to rent those units to residents making up to 130% of the area median income, or more than $192,000 per year for a family of three. 

"The word has gotten out that we need more affordable housing," said Peter Elkowitz, president and CEO of the Long Island Housing Partnership. "The question really is: affordable to whom?"

That’s the question that concerns residents like Volpe: Who will be able to afford to remain on Long Island? 

To Volpe, homeownership is part of the answer.

"I want the opportunity for young people to be able to create equity," Volpe said. "Yes, I would love to see that in small planned communities. I know the space doesn’t exist for that right now, so I would compromise with it being condos. I think the perpetual rent machines that go to investment companies and private equity firms is not what I want to see for the future."