A land deal approved by the Suffolk County Legislature expanding a railyard on Long Island will bring terrible repercussions for the people of Queens, elected officials, civic groups and residents of the borough said.
More than 230 acres of public land in Yaphank, L.I., was sold to the operators of the Brookhaven Rail Terminal last Thursday immediately after Glendale and Middle Village residents pleaded their case to Suffolk officials.
Residents and elected officials said the expansion of the terminal would greatly increase the number of garbage trains passing through the Fresh Pond Rail Terminal in Glendale, increasing train traffic and hurting clean air quality.
“The expansion of this rail terminal will prove chaotic and will be a health hazard to the residents of Glendale,” said Anthony Pedalino, who lives near the rail lines in Glendale and deals with the noise and odor on a nightly basis. “The people deserve a little protection. Trains sit there spewing out fumes an hour at a time. This is so inhumane, it’s revolting.”
The $20 million deal gives the land to Brookhaven Terminal Operations, which said in a statement it has worked with the community before and will participate in an advisory board.
But that is not good enough for the people of Queens, who believe Suffolk County has not taken the borough’s well-being into consideration.
Long Island is surrounded by water, so why not barge their trash out?
15 comments:
Our lives depend on decisions made by other people; we have, in reality, no control over these decisions and usually we do not even know the people who make them...
NYC is also surrounded by water. Why don't we barge our own trash out?
This city trucks and trains more garbage out through other areas than probably anywhere else. It's pretty hypocritical to say LI shouldn't do it.
It's hypocritical? What turnip truck did you fall off of?
Do you really think the people of Queens WANT trash trucked and trained out of here instead of barged? We didn't have much say in the matter, did we? If we can prevent MORE of it from coming through here, then let's do it.
The suggestion to barge the garbage of Queens CB1-6 and Brooklyn CB1-6 was made MANY times, yet Waste Management was given the contract, which utilizes trains. The Vallones lobbied for it, the mayor bought it and the people got screwed.
Hypocritical?
I'd like to see some actual fact based reporting on this alleged trash coming out of Suffolk. To date I have heard absolutely nothing about this ever happening. The current facility out there is only taking loaded cars inbound (of aggregates and I believe flour) - nothing but empty rail cars leave this facility.
I am a life long resident of queens, and I much prefer the rail cars that pass where I live than the endless amount of trash trucks that also pass where I live. There are less trucks now - and significantly less trash trucks just randomly parked idling all over queens (those 18 wheeler MSW trucks, often with the name 'kephardt' on the side.
As a driver, I feel a lot safer on the roads with less of these huge trucks around. As a queens resident, I'm glad that more bulk commodities are being shipped to LI using rail than trucks. NYC and LI are significantly behind the curve on this, and the cost of everything is higher due to the costs of getting anything into the area (costs that are higher by relying so heavily on trucks and the LIE - whcih last I checked is still one huge traffic jam full of many more dangerous trucks that don't need to be on that road if more goods went via rail.
I don't know why the city gov went with rail instead of barges for queens and brooklyn trash. I'm guessing it has to do with cost, and as a taxpayer, I'd rather see the city remove the trash in the least costly way possible. 1 train vs. hundreds of trucks? It's a no brainer.
The only people in queens that don't like this are those whiners around fresh pond who somehow magically failed to notice a huge rail hub in their neighborhood for the last 100 years - which ironically even with this added traffic is nowhere near as busy as it once was.
You must not be looking very hard. There are waste haulers parked along the LIE 24/7 in many neighborhoods. One or 2 used to park under 74th Street overpass, but the school construction and relentless ticketing by NYPD has pushed them out.
Fresh Pond currently receives trash trains from LI as well as Brooklyn and soon, LIC. All those are idling next to people's backyards because of the bottleneck at Fresh Pond, due to a giant increase in traffic through an antiquated hub.
1 barge = a whole lot of train cars.
Waste Management said they "didn't have enough trash" to make barging cost effective. What a crock of shit. Not to mention with trains, the stuff is being shipped north to eventually be sent south. Not exactly cost effective.
Sorry, but the "whiners around Fresh Pond" are correct. And you sir, can go back to being a railroad foamer on someone else's forum.
It's funny how Barging Brooklyn CB7-15's and Queens 7-14's trash is cost effective for another company... The requirement from the beginning wasnt Barging because WM lobbied to get the wording of the SWMP written to benefit their bid. The guy defending this needs an education in how things work in this town.
Direct quote from WM: "We don't barge."
Do you really think the people of Queens WANT trash trucked and trained out of here instead of barged?
It looks like you don't want to publish a valid answer to that question; that the vast majority wouldn't care one way or the other.
It's easy to sound right when you control what is said. It also undermines your credibility and highlights your closed mindedness.
The vast majority wouldn't care one way or the other, that's true. You could say that about any topic I post here. But for those that DO care, they want it barged.
As for your assertion that I am stifling dissent by not publishing your supposed previous comment, I didn't see a comment to publish, or I would have replied the same way earlier.
I can't believe this loser went from defending WM to saying most people don't care. He just doesn't seem to get the point if this discussion and seems hell bent on making it look like Queens deserves to get dumped on continuously from all directions.
Oh,
but we can not barge garbage along the waterfront and offend the new hipster communities.
We'll spoil their river views.
Can you imagine a flotilla of trash barges
following the shoreline promenade of Queens West?
So it gets moved through the working class nabes
of our borough instead.
Huge garbage barges from Ct and New England are bussed down the Long Island sound below the bridges and close to the N Queens waterfront.
Sometimes "doubles" heading down to lower NJ and Delaware. Most are "open" and stink for miles !
I had people throw up off the boat going to City Island. Its really nasty depending on the wind.
Don't trust the town of Brookhaven they have always been a den a of slobs and corruption.
The bid was for either barging or trains. WM got a sweetheart deal to move it by rail, when barging would have been a greener choice. They could have combined both Bklyn CB1-6 and Qns CB1-6 garbage and barged it off Newtown Creek. Then they would have "had enough" to make barging more cost effective.
Forget using the Fresh Ponds yard. Send all outbound trash cars to NJ for classification. There, it can join all the other trash loaded rail cars to form unit trains bound for landfills. Add 2 new switches and renew a few hundred feet of track and call it a day.
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