Two big chances to improve Long Island

For Hicksville and Ronkonkoma, the communities around the two busiest Long Island Rail Road stations in Nassau-Suffolk, there are some encouraging signs of progress toward the revitalization that they need so badly. But those signs may be like the first crocus of spring: colorful and hope-inspiring, but still vulnerable to late frost.

In Hicksville, the big news is the opening of a new parking garage next to the station, replacing the structurally damaged one that was closed in June 2008. That emergency closing created vast inconvenience -- and an opportunity for the Town of Oyster Bay to redesign and upgrade the area near the station. But there was no way to fit a new garage into that vision because there was no plan.

Hicksville is a major commuter hub, a close second to Ronkonkoma in ridership. It would be perfect for a more walkable, vibrant downtown -- the kind of place that Long Island needs in abundance. But it requires a plan. The garage fiasco underlined the consequences of Supervisor John Venditto's leadership style.

The supervisor is waiting for a blueprint to emerge from the Hicksville Chamber of Commerce, the Hicksville Community Council and Vision Long Island, a planning group. While he waits, he's spending $3 million on beautification: decorative lighting and trash receptacles, new sidewalks, additional trees. That's fine, but what Hicksville really needs is a plan that Venditto and the town board accept -- and soon.

In Ronkonkoma, Brookhaven Supervisor Mark Lesko, in his first full term, is taking a less hands-off approach than the veteran Venditto. He has met with property owners, who have a lot to gain from revitalizing the area across from the station. And the town has sent out a request to see who's interested in acting as a master developer. Based on the responses, due June 30, the town will put out a formal request for proposals.

Since the LIRR electrified the line to Ronkonkoma and added a parking garage and major station improvements, it has become a hub for people wanting a one-hour, one-seat ride to Manhattan. But the revitalization of commercial property has lagged far behind. In fact, Lesko identified Ronkonkoma as one of the town's "monuments to blight."

To fix it, Brookhaven wants to adopt a "form-based code." This style of zoning, now in use across the country and recently adopted by Denver and Miami, is suitable to mixed-use downtowns. It's about form: how structures look and fit into a vision of how the downtown should appear. In traditional zoning, the main idea is to separate different uses. For downtowns, that level of separation isn't useful. People need to be able to walk from where they live to where they shop or work.

We like Lesko's active approach more than Venditto's "Oyster Bay Way" of avoiding controversy by doing little. But he can prove us wrong by seizing the moment, picking up the plan the community produces, and moving forward boldly. In fact, all of Long Island will be the winner if this becomes a sort of downtown "race to the top" between the two communities. If we can't make natural mass-transit hubs like these into exciting downtowns, the future of the whole Island will be bleak.