Ronkonkoma Hub's future is murky more than a year after Midway Crossing's demise

A year and a half after Suffolk County Executive Edward P. Romaine killed the $2.8 billion Midway Crossing megadevelopment in Ronkonkoma, revitalization plans for 48 acres of county-owned land in the hamlet remain stalled amid debate over costs and the viability of economic redevelopment.

Various versions of the scuttled plan over the years had called for a hockey arena, a convention center, a hotel and a link from the Ronkonkoma train station to Long Island MacArthur Airport.

Romaine has yet to offer a new proposal for the site, leaving some local officials frustrated — including the Suffolk County Legislature's presiding officer, Anthony Piccirillo.

Meanwhile, Islip Town officials are in the early stages of drawing up plans for a new terminal at the airport, just to the south. That, too, faces an uncertain fate amid opposition among some of them.

But the idea of developing the area known as the Ronkonkoma Hub — with or without a new MacArthur terminal and a link to the train station — still has fans among Long Island business and political leaders. They see an opportunity to build on the success of nearby Station Yards and transform a central Suffolk hamlet with a history of economic stagnation.

And, supporters say, failure to deliver in Ronkonkoma risks losing $150 million committed by Gov. Kathy Hochul to jump-start revitalization.

"I think that would be very unfortunate," said Mitchell Pally, who had been chairman of a Suffolk-Islip local development corporation charged with shepherding Midway Crossing, in a phone interview. "We always complain that Long Island doesn’t get its fair share of state money. We’re hopeful that everyone can see the benefit of using it for that purpose and not giving it back."

In addition to the state money, Suffolk planned to use about $50 million from the county hotel/motel tax to help fund the project.

Piccirillo, in an interview, said any plan that involved spending public money would be dead on arrival.

"I could have an idea to build an Empire State Building in Ronkonkoma — it doesn’t mean that’s going to happen," Piccirillo (R-Holtsville) told Newsday. "That money is just sitting there. It’s taxpayer money, and we should be able to access it for infrastructure problems that are pressing right now."

The county executive's office did not make Romaine available for an interview. But at a June 12 appearance in Woodbury, he said he has not given up hope for Ronkonkoma redevelopment.

He told an audience of about 1,500 businesspeople, politicians and nonprofit leaders attending the annual Vision Long Island Smart Growth Awards ceremony that he planned to release a request for proposals, a tool for seeking potential developers, soon.

"There are so many things that we should be building, like a transportation hub at Ronkonkoma, which is absolutely necessary," Romaine told the gathering. He praised the Station Yards housing and retail development built north of the station but said something else is needed south of the railroad tracks.

"We’re looking for something a little bit different — not housing, but maybe medical, maybe research, a whole host of possibilities there," he said. "We're going to test the waters with an RFP later. Despite some opposition, we’re going to go forward."

Holding out hope

Supporters of Ronkonkoma development agree it's far too soon to declare the project's demise. 

"There’s no logical or viable reason to give up on it," said John Cameron, a Woodbury engineer and executive principal of IMEG, an international engineering firm with dozens of U.S. offices. 

Cameron, who also chairs the Long Island Regional Planning Council, had been principal engineer for Midway Crossing before Romaine canceled it. 

"I’m not sure Anthony Piccirillo is on the same page as the county executive," Cameron said. "We’re losing a lot of our residents. A lot of our seniors and our more affluent residents are moving down south. ... If we don’t grow our economy, the future for Long Island will be very bleak."

The debate centers on a vast county-owned parking lot between MacArthur and the Ronkonkoma Long Island Rail Road station. Currently occupied by thousands of parking spaces for LIRR commuters, the area is part of the hub that for decades has been eyed for redevelopment.

On the north side of the railroad tracks, the $1.2 billion, Brookhaven Town-sponsored Station Yards development, built by Ronkonkoma-based Tritec Real Estate, is rising. It comprises hundreds of new apartments and thousands of square feet of retail and commercial space, with more coming.

But on the south side, development has been stymied for eight years by shifting plans and a revolving door of Suffolk political leadership. 

Plans to redevelop the parking lot took off in April 2018, when then-County Executive Steve Bellone, a Democrat, announced a $1 billion deal with Chicago developer Jones Lang LaSalle to build a 17,500-seat hockey arena and related medical facilities.

That idea was quickly panned by county lawmakers and morphed into a new vision — a convention center and hotel — with an additional partner, Islip Town, which pitched the prospect of a new air terminal and a link to the train station. The plan was rebranded Midway Crossing.

Romaine, a Republican, succeeded Bellone in January 2024 and announced a year later he was terminating Midway Crossing, saying JLL had failed to make significant progress in staffing and funding the project.

At the time, Romaine spokesperson Michael Martino said the county planned to "reimagine the Midway project, paving the way for new ideas and strategies to benefit the surrounding communities, improve infrastructure, and create a powerful economic engine for our county."

But plans have stalled since then.

Last month, Piccirillo told Newsday's The Point political blog that $200 million earmarked for developing the property — including the $150 million grant announced by Hochul, and hotel/motel tax revenue — had been removed from the county capital budget.

Ronkonkoma redevelopment was "on life support," he said at a county legislature capital budget hearing, The Point reported. "I don’t want to spend one more dollar of taxpayer money on this project that’s never going to get off the ground."

Piccirillo's views were harshly criticized by Islip Supervisor Angie Carpenter, a fellow Republican, who is backing the construction of a north airport terminal that would connect MacArthur with the Ronkonkoma train station via something like a monorail. The airport is owned and operated by the town.

And that, too, is a complication.

While a new air terminal was part of Midway Crossing, the town is pursuing its MacArthur plans separately from the county.

The two projects would require cooperation between the town and county if Islip decides to run a transportation link through the hub from MacArthur to the train station, officials say.

Carpenter faces opposition from some town board members who have cast doubt on the need to relocate the terminal. The town board didn't take up the issue at its meeting last Tuesday. 

"Common sense has got to prevail," Carpenter said in an interview before the meeting. "I think [opponents] can posture and maybe try to play games, but even Legislator Piccirillo is going to have to realize that this is really a good thing. ... He’ll probably be the first one on line to take a flight out of there."

She warned that Suffolk would lose the state funding if no project materializes.

"I would venture to guess the governor and the state would think long and hard before they allocate any additional funding to Suffolk County," she said.

In an email Friday, spokesperson Gordon Tepper said Hochul "remains committed to working with Suffolk County to strengthen transit connections and foster job creation at the Ronkonkoma Hub. Any decisions regarding those funds in the future would be evaluated based on the circumstances at that time."

'Too valuable to not be developed'

Hub development still has the support of key Long Island business groups, including the Long Island Association, whose acting president and chief executive, Stacey Sikes, called it an "opportunity to unlock the economic potential of an integrated rail-air destination that drives business growth, attracts investment, and creates jobs."

Pally, a former Metropolitan Transportation Authority board member, said the Ronkonkoma site is "too valuable to not be developed or to be used as parking lots."

"The project obviously has been significantly delayed for a variety of reasons," he said. "But do we still think it’s worthwhile? The answer to that question is yes. Do we think it’s a benefit to the residents of Suffolk County? The answer to that question is yes." 

But detractors say any project that has been around as long as the hub without making any discernible progress is likely destined for failure. 

"There's been a lot of false starts here. To have one branch [of government] be not fully on board with the vision says the likelihood of this happening isn’t very good," said Richard Murdocco, a Stony Brook University adjunct professor and author of "The Foggiest Idea," an economic development blog. 

"You need to be in sync," he said. "Moving that [airport] terminal physically closer to the railroad station would create a true intermodal hub, but the other levels in government have to be on board."

Martin Cantor, a former Suffolk County economic development chief, said he agrees with Piccirillo that no public money should be involved.

"I don’t think he's saying, 'It’s dead in the water.' He’s saying, 'No taxpayer dollars,' " said Cantor, director of the Long Island Center for Socio-Economic Policy in Melville. "Right now, Piccirillo is not wrong. ... The taxpayers somehow have to be considered."

Beyond the debate about whether to develop the parking lot site, some observers and officials don't agree on what to put there.

Many favor a convention center, calling the site an ideal location between MacArthur and the train station.

"We don’t have one on Long Island," Cantor said. "What conventioneers want is, they want an airport that is within 25 minutes of a convention center."

Others are not so sure.

Murdocco said convention centers are "a financial loser in these kinds of markets."

"You really just need housing and you need to foster interconnectedness between trains, the planes and the buses, and this is the spot to do it," Murdocco said.

He pointed to the emerging Melville Town Center project in Huntington — a mix of residential and retail planned a few blocks from state Route 110 — as an example of smart suburban planning.

"It takes us awhile," Murdocco said, "but eventually we do things."

Newsday's James T. Madore contributed to this story.