NY Post
The new $41.5 million Queens Public Library branch at Hunters Point, where design flaws have made it a target of critics since opening in September, could get even more expensive thanks to a new lawsuit demanding improvements to help disabled patrons.
In a class-action lawsuit filed on Tuesday in Brooklyn federal court, disabilities advocates say that Queens Public Library violated the federal Americans with Disabilities Act by failing to ensure that disabled patrons will have equal access to all parts of the new branch.
When the branch opened, a three-tiered fiction section only had a single staircase leading up to it and was unreachable by the building’s single elevator.
The plaintiffs, the Center for the Independence of the Disabled and a Queens woman with mobility issues, say disabled people are also unable to reach the branch’s rooftop terrace and a reading space on the children’s floor.
The plaintiffs are calling on the library to “swiftly” execute plans to remove barriers to equal access to areas within the Hunters Point branch.
The suit was filed just two months after the 32,000-square foot library was opened to the public — at which point library officials hailed it as a “stunning architectural marvel” and a “beacon of learning, literacy and culture.”
“The newly-built Hunters Point Library was designed and built with a total disregard for adults and children with mobility disabilities and in flagrant contempt of the legal requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act,” the 21-page lawsuit states.
17 comments:
The point is this is happening after the board was fired and a new 'clean' board put in its place. Its an open question if something like this is possible in this borough.
The QBPL should be merged with the professional NYPL. Enough of the 'Old Boys'. The way the borough is run its still in the 19th Century. Lets force it into the 21st.
*bangs head on wall*
Can you imagine, after decades of ADA legislation, this DeBlasio administration OK's a piece of crap like this. Is that bum still running for higher office?
Someone from the Queens Public Library had to sign off on the architect's faculty design, right? Can't put all the blame on former President/CEO Tom Galante, who was busy out on his smoking deck. How about Ruth Herzberg, Director, Operational Library Facility Planning at Queens Library?
> When the branch opened, a three-tiered fiction section only had a single staircase leading up to it and was unreachable by the building’s single elevator.
Isn't that also a dangerous violation of fire code? You need to have two exits in case one is impassible in an emergency.
Great, there aren't enough legal parking spaces as it is, and now tens of thousands of people will be competing for the rest of us for what little parking there is.
A bill like this would be great if it went along with an increase in parking. But instead, parking spaces are being removed for unused bike lanes, unnecessary and unsightly pavement bumps into the street, or just because the mayor feels people aren't having a hard enough time driving already. This can only make an already bad situation worse.
These people should spend more energy at the gym and dietitians office then asking the public to pay for their bad choices in life.
The truly disabled don't use library's, they use computers & e-ink pads.
Only lazy morbid obese and single moms pushing 2+ kid in strollers want this, and kids stull isn't on the upper floors anyway!
Obesity and daily trips to McDonald for chickenuggers & French frys is not a disability, its a bad choice.
Hell, So is using a NYC public library for that matter. The Albanians watching porn, running Craigslist whores or all the little gangster animals will jump or shank you outside just for saying "be quite please"
Screw that daycare service handout for feral unruly animals!
Any normal, non-architect person would know not to design without checking ADA requirements. How is it that "experts" neglect to do this? Reminds me (strangely enough) of the baseball world, where any normal sports fan would know not to sign an aging star for a ten year giant contract.But then, the "experts" go right ahead and do it.
And 104 years later - the nearby Astoria library has no access in ANY part of its facility with at least 2 senior centers nearby... NICE!
"least 2 senior centers nearby"
True however senior centers get book delivered.
They have more books in them places then the library, look how packed and overflowing some donate dumpsters at library's are. Just about all them books end up at senior centers before being railed off to some incinerator or landfill in Ohio.
Just about every book made has been scanned on to a chip the size of a fingernail, and with modern e-ink readers with the same softness and ambient light reflective quality's as reading paper.
I don't know of any seniors that will risk going to a library these days.
And 104 years later - the nearby Astoria library has no access in ANY part of its facility with at least 2 senior centers nearby... NICE!
What is nice is its slated to be torn down, like the Elmhurst branch. Both are Carnegie Libraries.
Fun Fact: in Manhattan they can make these conversions AND save their libraries. But then the NYPL Board was never forcibly replaced either.
This was intended on being a backdrop for the rich and famous with Manhattan sunsets in a place that is to be, on paper, for the public good paid for with public funds.
Came across an entry for the LIC Library branch built in the mid-sixties - cost?
About $350,000.
QBPL is the only major public institution not under the thumb of Manhattan. Whatever its faults submerging QBPL with NYPL would ensure that Queens residents get less in library services. NYPL professionals wanted to disembowel the historic library on 5th Ave in favor of a Mike Bloomberg monstrosity devoid of books. Reading is easier for the Deep State crowd to monitor when it done online.
QBPL is the only major public institution not under the thumb of Manhattan. Whatever its faults submerging QBPL with NYPL would ensure that Queens residents get less in library services. NYPL professionals wanted to disembowel the historic library on 5th Ave in favor of a Mike Bloomberg monstrosity devoid of books. Reading is easier for the Deep State crowd to monitor when it done online.
Oh please, that arguement is always dangled in front of Queens residents. We know what devil we have, its time to take a look elsewhere. The rest of the city is moving forward.
Take a look at the board of NYPL. Unthinkable they would do the antics we put up with as a matter of course. Time that Queens finally becomes part of NYC.
Democrats don't read anything anyway! NYC is a Democrat enclave.
QBPL is the only major public institution not under the thumb of Manhattan. Whatever its faults submerging QBPL with NYPL would ensure that Queens residents get less in library services.
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Don't think so - that is why we have elected officials. They can stop that from happening without raising a sweat. The Queens Machine is the "Elephant in the Room" when it comes to NYC politics.
Hell, they so powerful their block can force 'Queens Values' on the rest of the city when it comes to egregious development projects (which resemble watered down versions of the third-world nightmares we are building along places like Queens Blvd).
All this to the consternation of those who represent their own communities in the other boroughs and see their efforts are undermined by the massive Queens Machine bloc - whose most ardent pupil occupies the White House.
why ? are you a Gimp?
Looks nice. ADA accessible. bah who needs it.
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