Chamber Seeks to Fill Empty Turnpike Stores

Hempstead Turnpike was once Levittown's busiest place of business.

"When people think of Levittown, they think of Hempstead Turnpike automatically," said Levittown Chamber of Commerce president Dean Baer. "There really aren’t that many other landmarks for Levittown except Hempstead Turnpike."

"It was the only place [where] there were department stores where you could buy clothing, shoe stores," said Louise Cassano, a past president of the Chamber. "The main shopping, if you had to do big shopping, was Hempstead Turnpike. There was constant traffic."

Hempstead Turnpike still has constant traffic. But it's no longer the shopping hub it once was. You don't have to travel far to see an empty building or lot along the thoroughfare. 

"What’s happening here is an embarrassment to us, and it’s really disturbing to see all of this," Cassano said. "It’s almost looking to the point where it’s starting to look like a ghost town."

A point of pride for Cassano, who's a lifelong Levittown resident, is that Levittown hasn't become the ghost town that naysayers projected. She, Baer and the Chamber want to make sure it won't happen again.

The Chamber is planning an advertising campaign to push for the rejuvenation of the empty buildings along Hempstead Turnpike. While the Chamber will push the plan and will meet with local constituents, they also want to get support from the community itself.

"We’re only 200 members and business owners," Baer said. "Not everyone that’s a member of our organization is a constituent here and lives in Levittown, so we need more of the public’s support and approval [to make sure] we’re at least barking up the right tree."

The Chamber always encourages residents to shop locally. But a combination of a poor economy and poor aesthetics hurt potential business and confound other problems.

"There’s nothing that attracts the people to the stores locally," Cassano said. "The businesses are not doing well, and the businesses are not paying the taxes that we need in order to keep our home taxes down."

Some of the frustration stems from the process businesses need to fulfill in order to open. The Chamber wants to work with the different local constituencies in an effort to better understand what they expect.

"We’re not looking to hit any of them with something coming out of left field," Baer said. "We want to start with some of our local politicians, pretty much letting them know where we’re at here and what their ideas are too."

Baer and Cassano noted a trend for communities to construct buildings with businesses on the first floor and apartments above, and suggested that they might be a good fit for Levittown, as the community has little room for land expansion. But they also mentioned a willingness to listen to outside suggestions.

"I wouldn’t mind seeing planners come in that can look at our area and say “this is smart growth, this is bad growth,” Baer said. "Because maybe we are promoting bad growth. We don’t know until we have those types of studies done."

"Maybe we need to have a better understanding of [these issues]," Cassano said. "Certainly the public needs to have a better understanding of what’s going on."

What's clear to them is that something needs to be done. The Chamber hopes that its ad campaign can spur the effort needed to revitalize the community.

"If it’s like this now, and we don’t do anything about it, do you really think it’s going to get better?" Baer said. "It’s impossible. That’s the definition of insane, doing things the same way over and over again and expecting different results."

"We’ve survived the first 50 years," Cassano said. "We want to survive the next 50, the next 150. We need to update, we need to rejuvenate the community, revitalize the community. If we don’t, we’re going to fall by the wayside."