Saturday, November 29, 2014

Pedestrian safety = taller buildings?

Sometimes you just gotta sit back and laugh at the desperation of these "transportation advocates" to be taken seriously. It was brought to my attention that Streetsblog has a post up about transforming Queens Blvd, which includes trees in the medians, above subway tracks, where they can't be planted, and tall buildings in Forest Hills where 1-story commercial enterprises currently are situated:
Remaking Queens Boulevard is about more than just street geometry. Massengale also envisions taller buildings along the street to match its width and create a place that feels less like a wide-open highway and more like a grand boulevard.
When you click through to the original analysis they are pimping, you find this:
You can see in the “Before” photo above that the market has clearly said over the years that housing away from the artery (even just half a block away) is more desirable for most than being right on the boulevard. Even the main shopping is one block away from the boulevard in some locations.
Now, as you and I know, there are already a TON of tall buildings situated along Queens Blvd, so it's interesting that they decided to focus on this stretch where the tall buildings are set back and claim it has anything to do with pedestrian safety or livability.

Real estate shilling much?

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

There are plenty of tall buildings right along QB. Are they shorter there because of zoning? What's the deal.?

Anonymous said...

these idiots want to make it hard for anyone who has a car thinking it will make it safer.

in reality that picture will be full of half mad drivers fighting for scarce parking and running over people. like they do in parts of brooklyn

Anonymous said...

Looks great to me and better then what's there now. Queens Blvd is ugly and the cars travel too fast.

You guys have any better ideas?

Anonymous said...

That's moronic. I don't see any legitimate connection between more residential buildings along QB and pedestrian safety. I DO however picture the already crowded trains becoming unbearable at rush hours. Please, no.

Anonymous said...

10 lbs of crap in a 5 lb. bag!!!

Anonymous said...

"Queens Blvd is ugly and the cars travel too fast."

And what does building tall apartment towers have to do with making cars slower? These anti car people are not aesthetiticians or magicians.

Anonymous said...

They want to shrink the service roads, get travel speeds on them closer to what you see on ocean or eastern parkway. Taller buildings don't hurt pedestrians as long as you maintain retail on the ground floor. The aesthetics might be improved somewhat, but that's not as important as slowing cars on the service road. Make it really just for local access instead of overflow from the main road. Eastern parkway has plenty of trees over a subway. Why can't QB have any?