Thursday, October 1, 2026
As a lifelong East Rockaway resident currently serving in the military in Japan, I’ve read much about the plans to rezone the area around the East Rockaway train station and the opposition to it.
To the charge that this would threaten the “suburban nature” of East Rockaway, this village is something far better than simply a suburb. Regional planners would call East Rockaway a “streetcar suburb,” due to our existential link with rail-based transit. Unlike the car-centric suburbs that grew with the onset of parkways on Long Island, we uniquely came into our own with the advent of the New York and Long Beach Railroad over forty years earlier. Make no mistake that the generation that first moved here to take advantage of that rail link was not welcomed by the baymen that preceded them. Ultimately, however, this influx of people brought positive growth and as density grew, real-estate values grew exponentially. Many fine communities in our area have affordable medium-density housing surrounding their train stations such as Rockville Centre and Great Neck — the latter utilizing mixed-use commercial/residential buildings similar to the ones East Rockaway’s proposal recommends. I challenge readers to go to the communities above and see if they feel unsafe, or that the suburban nature of the area surrounding the train station was compromised. Even in our own community, multi-story apartments already complement the Centre Avenue train station, and few would argue that our way of life was negatively impacted upon their construction. Rather than weaken what East Rockaway stands for, rail-focused medium-density housing would enhance it.
While I understand the concerns of those who balk at the possibility of Section 8 housing, the argument doesn’t stand up to logic. To believe it, one must also believe that the developer is obsessed with losing tens of millions of dollars, almost certainly beyond any reasonable tax write-off.
