John Kominicki, Author at Long Island Index

Author: John Kominicki

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki: Attention Jeff Bezos – The Times doesn’t know what it’s talking about!

By John Kominicki, September 21, 2017 in Economy, Innovation

Amazon is accepting proposals on where it should locate its second corporate headquarters, a mammoth $5 billion office center that, when finished, will be a third larger than the Pentagon and employ 50,000 people in “high-paying” jobs. That would make it Long Island’s largest employer overnight, topping even county government. And Stop & Shop. As

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki: A little hubba hubba for the Nassau Hub

By John Kominicki, August 22, 2017 in Innovation

Nassau County’s plan to transform the acres of parking lots around the Coliseum into a hub for medical research and biotechnology is a great first step toward creating the well-paying, “knowledge industry” jobs that can transform the Long Island economy and keep young Long Islanders living here. But the County’s plan doesn’t make enough of

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki: The third track project proves that good things come to those who wait. For 70 years.

By John Kominicki, July 20, 2017 in Transit

A state review board has approved the Long Island Rail Road’s long-considered third track project, a $2 billion plan that will speed service, enhance reliability and eliminate dangerous traffic crossings along a 10-mile stretch of rail between Hicksville and the Queens border. Four major lines link up with the main track there, meaning the fix

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki: 60 years on, we’ve discovered that size, at least when it comes to housing, really matters

By John Kominicki, May 11, 2017 in Housing

History has anointed Bill Levitt the king of suburbia, but the crown might have as easily gone to Walter Turnbull Shirley, a Brooklyn-born song promoter and wannabe impresario who turned to selling Long Island’s pastoral charm to the masses in the late 1930s. As Shirley told the story, he smooth-talked his way into a meeting

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki: After years of rethinking Route 110, it appears to be time for the shovels

By John Kominicki, April 10, 2017 in Development, Transit

If you’ve tired of reading about projects that will break ground sometime after your last kid moves to North Carolina, here’s some good news. The towns of Babylon and Huntington are veritably skipping along on the Route 110 Plan, which, OK, isn’t actually called that and really isn’t a single comprehensive plan but rather a

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki: It’s All about Keeping Our Future on Track

By John Kominicki, February 8, 2017 in Transit, Transit-oriented Development

America’s first railroad was the Baltimore & Ohio, chartered in 1827 to compete with New York’s Erie Canal in the lucrative business of shipping goods westward. Baltimore was America’s third-largest city then – with designs on getting bigger – and the new railway was celebrated with parades and fireworks and a ceremonial groundbreaking at which

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki: Your Chromosomes Want to Pump You Up

By John Kominicki, January 23, 2017 in Health

Some of the most interesting genetic research being performed today – including work at our own Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and Stony Brook University – concerns telomeres, the protective caps on the ends of chromosomes, those thread-like strands that store our genetic information. Very simply put, the longer and more vibrant your telomeres, the better

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki: There’s a Real Buzz about the Future of Long Island

By John Kominicki, August 23, 2016 in Economy, Health, Innovation

There’s significant medical news to report, and I’m not just talking about whether you should still floss now that it’s been revealed that the practice actually does nothing to prevent gum disease. (What did we expect? It is, after all, waxed string.) No, I’m talking about incredible research – much of it being performed right

How Irrational Fear Is Driving L.I.’s Housing Crisis Over the Brink

By John Kominicki, July 21, 2016 in Housing

“Our young people continue to leave the region in droves, seeking affordable places to live elsewhere.”

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki: In Global Warming, it’s Not That Tough to Keep Your Cool

By John Kominicki, June 13, 2016 in Environment

Good news, fellow humanoids. The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere didn’t increase in 2015, for the second year running. Bigger news: This is the first time emissions have fallen or remained flat without a giant economic meltdown of some sort. In other words, we managed to cut the spew of energy-related carbon even

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki: Gov. Cuomo’s Third Track Express is Wisely Asking Folks to get on Board

By John Kominicki, May 17, 2016 in Transit

One of Samuel Goldwyn’s best lines: “It’s absolutely impossible, but it has possibilities.” The same might be said for the proposed third track of the Long Island Rail Road. First suggested more than a decade ago, the extra rails would clear a bottleneck between Hicksville and Floral Park, where five LIRR branches carrying more than

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki

By John Kominicki, April 19, 2016 in Development, Population, Revitalization, Transit-oriented Development

Changing housing preferences are chipping away at the old block

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki

By John Kominicki, March 22, 2016 in Development, Economy

There’s been an enormous uptick in entrepreneurial activity in our country over the past decade, a surge not seen since the days of Edison and Tesla.

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki

By John Kominicki, March 15, 2016 in Development, Economy, Housing

What happens when the cost of living makes living here unlivable? It’s no surprise that almost 75 percent of young Long Islanders say they expect to move away over the next five years to find better-paying jobs and cheaper rents.

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki

By John Kominicki, March 10, 2016 in Economy, Housing, Long Island Index, Population, Revitalization, Transit-oriented Development

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70 percent of young Long Islanders – the 18 to 34 crowd – said they will likely leave within the next five years to find more affordable digs.

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki

By John Kominicki, December 28, 2015 in Development, Housing

Apartment development claws its way back on Long Island.

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki

By John Kominicki, November 17, 2015 in Environment

We have plenty of clean water on Long Island. The problem is the stuff we’re putting into it.

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki

By John Kominicki, September 23, 2015 in Economy

We should have grabbed ‘Cradle of Innovation’ when we had the chance.

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki

By John Kominicki, September 11, 2015 in Economy

It’s better to have unicorned and lost than never to have unicorned at all.

Unconventional Wisdom from John Kominicki

By John Kominicki, August 20, 2015 in Economy, Population

There are, in truth, many cool places to live on Long Island for those who can afford them, and developers are building more, in downtowns, near train stations and along the beach. Patchogue, Wyandanch, Ronkonkoma – one by one, some of the Island’s most ‘burbish backwaters are being transformed into rental meccas.

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