The past month has reignited a debate about the future of a defunct rail in Queens.
Assemblywoman Stacey Pheffer Amato (D-Rockaway Park) shed some attention on the efforts to transform the abandoned Rockaway Beach Rail Line running through Central and South Queens when she asked for federal infrastructure to create a new rail line along the tracks.
But for years, The Trust for Public Land, a conservation group, has been lobbying to convert a 3.5-mile path along the abandoned rail into the QueensWay, a park similar to Manhattan’s High Line, stretching from Rego Park to Ozone Park.
Unlike the plan to create a rail line that would require federal support, the fate of the QueensWay project will ultimately rely on the city’s capital budget. While the estimated cost to create a train line ranges from $6.7 billion to reactivate the rail spur for the LIRR to $8.1 billion to create a subway connector, a 2014 study for the QueensWay pegged it at an estimated $120 million, a cost that would come out of the mayor’s capital budget, said Karen Imas, a volunteer advocate for the project.
The QueensWay recently got some new publicity after mayoral hopeful Andrew Yang mentioned it as a key part of his plan to invest in park space. Nine mayoral candidates have endorsed the New Yorkers for Parks Five Point Plan for Parks Equity that mentions building new parks like the QueensWay as a priority. On Wednesday former Sanitation Department Commissioner Kathryn Garcia held a press conference in which she joined Yang in explicit support of the QueensWay.
Yang’s campaign website said that while he’s aware of the need to improve transportation in South Queens, he doesn’t believe a subway to be feasible and he’s committed to seeing the trail through to fruition. The platform adds that the QueensWay would add to the area’s transportation through offering multimodal transportation, such as safe walking and bike paths that build access to the neighboring bus stops and subway lines.
Imas said that the pandemic has awakened an appetite for more green space “and needs around parks, the needs for more safe cycling in areas that don’t have a lot of bike paths or safe cycling areas.”
Within the span of Woodhaven, Richmond Hill and Ozone Park that the park would cut through, there are five contiguous ZIP codes that contain no bike lanes or cycling infrastructure whatsoever.
Imas added that though the estimated cost of the project is over $100 million, the construction of the path would take a phased approach, and the request for its first phase would cost somewhere between $20 and $25 million.
On the other hand, Pheffer Amato said that part of her intention in writing the letter asking for federal funding for the rail was to make sure “the conversation about this railroad stays active.”
“The MTA knows two things about our district: We want the toll removed on the Cross Bay Bridge, and we need better transportation options in Southern Queens and that the RBRL is a solution to that problem,” said Pheffer Amato in a stateme
15 comments:
More Bike Lanes Yippee !
Is there anyway possible to put a few hotels on the line
By the time a decision is made you and I will be dead.Progress...
ALAS, nepotism works well for the 'Pheffer-Fraudulent Family Political Dynasty' (of not so friendly robbers), and their 'Useful Idiot' lawyer, Larry Love——all of whom can take what they have achieved, place those infinitesimally marginal attempts at public service into a thimble——and, SHAKE IT!
Sadly, political dynasties of epic government fail are the rule throughout New York City and New York State: It's a 'Rite of Passage' that forcefully mainains that: 'RIGHT is WRONG——and, WRONG is RIGHT!' And, the public be damned! What? WHAT?? THIS IS NEW???
❝Voting gives consent to profound, political criminals to continue to fleece all of you politically indoctrinated 'SHEEPLE' like human cattle——ALL the way to the bloody red gates of the abattoir. You DO NOT have to be livestock for criminals and archaic, party-machine-failed cults AND government-entrenched Mafia crime family rings. Nobody ever CHANGED the MAFIA——by JOINING IT!❞ ——Anonymous
❝Voting has become a farce, if indeed it was ever anything else. By voting, the people decide only which of the oligarchs pre-selected for them as viable candidates will wield the whip used to flog them and will command the legion of willing accomplices who perpetrate the countless violations of the people's natural rights.❞ ―—Robert Higgs
❝Voting is not an act of political freedom. It is an act of political conformity. Those who refuse to vote are not expressing silence. They are screaming in the politician's ear: 'You do not represent me. This is not a process in which my voice matters. I do not believe you.'❞ —―Wendy McElroy
❝The political system, as many Bernie Sanders supporters are about to discover, is immune to reform. The only effective resistance will be achieved through acts of sustained, mass civil disobedience. the Democrats, like the Republicans, have no intention of halting the assault on our civil liberties, the expansion of imperial wars, the coddling of Wall Street, the destruction of the ecosystem by the fossil fuel industry and the impoverishment of workers. As long as the Democrats and the Republicans remain in power, we are doomed.❞ ——Chris Hedges
❝Laws are created to be followed by the poor. Laws are created by the rich to bring some order to exploitation of the poor. The poor are the only law-abiders in history. When the poor make laws——the rich will be no more.❞ ——Roque Dalton García (1974)
❝The illusion of freedom will continue as long as it's profitable to continue the illusion. At the point where the illusion becomes too expensive to maintain, they will just take down the scenery, they will pull back the curtains, they will move the tables and chairs out of the way——and you will see the brick wall at the back of the theater.❞ ——Frank Zappa
❝It’s ridiculous to talk about freedom in a society dominated by huge corporations. What kind of freedom is there inside a corporation? They’re totalitarian institutions——you take orders from above, and maybe give them to people below you. There’s about as much freedom as under Stalinism.❞ ——Noam Chomsky
❝Alas, mental slavery is the worst form of slavery. It gives one the illusion of freedom, makes one trust, love and defend one's oppressor, while making an enemy of those whom are trying to free you—and to open your eyes!❞ ——Anonymous
❝Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.❞ ——John Adams
❝The collapse of the Roman Empire is a few pages in your high school history book, but in reality it took nearly 250 years. Generations lived WHOLE lives inside of the collapse——which is EXACTLY where we are right now——that our WHOLE lives will be lived inside of those few pages called 'collapse.'❞ ——David Sirota (@davidsirota)
While the estimated cost to create a train line ranges from $6.7 billion to reactivate the rail spur for the LIRR to $8.1 billion to create a subway connector
It cost 6 billion to build the 2nd Ave subway, and that required underground digging and has vast underground stations.
What the hell will cost so much in an above-ground line with the land and right-of-way already secure?
Why do the stupid move to live full time in Rockaway and Breezy then bitch: "Oh two hours to get to Manhattan by subway" "we demand special rail"
I noted many Wall street types moved into Breezy Point and Roxbury. All they do is bitch, moan, destroy or alter all the nice old bungalows into the same shit you see in Whitestone and Malba these days.
--Horrible, let them suffer and get mugged on the subway !!
To last Anonymous who said:
"Horrible, let them suffer and get mugged on the subway."
The clannish (mostly) Irish communities of Breezy Point and Roxbury are complicit with letting their coveted ocean and beach towns fall to the mediocrity of feeble architecture and ugly, prosaic rows of blighted development. If only those precious bungalows were landmarked so many decades ago throughout the Rockaways, but here in New York City, the landmark commissions betray preservation and conservation with impunity, so unlike other cities that value their antiquities like Boston, Philadelphia, and yes, even BrainWashington, DC!
The only thing that would save Breezy Point from these 'hideosities' at this late juncture in time (that continue to pollute the landscape) is, sadly, another hurricane to flatten the playing field, and hopefully to relearn from the past historical grievances, eyesores and cheap, ugly developments that pass for modern design and architecture. Bring back those fine retainers of the old standard: That's why they outlast decades of human life forms, because they were designed and built that way.
Quote ""The clannish (mostly) Irish communities of Breezy Point and Roxbury""
Yep, I hate those clannish gypsy type mother-F_ckers
My girlfriends family had a bungalow in Breezy before for near 100 years, before these Irish came. The hurricane burned it down.
Those Irish hated us, complained about everything, music, party's, even DRINKING!always calling the cops. We never made a mess, weren't, loud and kept that bungalow pristine with well pruned tree and lawn.
Yet is seemed these Irish felt entitled to litter their property's with children's toys, bicycles, laundry, garbage, never swept, never pull weeds. Baseballs coming through the windows. Excuse: "Deal with it or move, We have 6, 8 kids its hard times how dare you!" And whatever boiled meats and shit they were always cooking reeked like Louisiana swamp gas.
Same shit with the Irish in Montauk, Springs and Fort Pond these days where they own most the restaurants, bars and motels, perhaps worse. Instead of small lots of garbage you small 2br homes on 1/2 acre lots of garbage with 20+ restaurant industry service workers from Ireland warehoused in shifts, 200 feet of laundry and sheets everyday on different clotheslines, cesspools overflowing stink of toilet.
-Joe
I remember my Grandfather saying Breezy Point was a paradise until around 1960 when the Irish put homes on the landfill that makes up 1/2 of that area. They dropped anchor in huge numbers with HUGE FAMILYS and outvoting the Italians in the older section to form a Co-Op appointed their own to the board of directors of that Co-Op.
Things went straight to hell, nobody could buy a home unless they were recommended by three Co-Op members. The prospective buyer then had another step requiring some high unanimous vote from the board of directors.
I do not understand how this is not racism, discrimination or why its never spoken about.
Zoë
I thought Gypsies came from Romania? Not a big fan of the Corned Beef myself, but the smell isn't all that bad. Better than the smell from tacky bell or mikey d's ( Is that Scottish ? ) . I hear they eat a lot of mutton too. The Sheeple won't like that one bit.
@Joe
Irish complaining about your drinking? What were you drinking Grande Latte's?
@Zoe
Well I bet the crime dropped once the Italians moved out.
Joe: What were you drinking Grande Latte's?
Sambuca, Grappa, Corn Liquor or wine (home made Sangria)...I don't like beer.
-Joe
@Joe said... Montauk was great 70 years ago. Hither Hills was wonderful.
>>Irish complaining about your drinking? What were you drinking Grande Latte's<<
Well, not exactly.
As many may know Joe was John Entwistles Bass and backline tech after he quit NBC.
It was just a last party, with John, Leslie West, Ace Frehley and members of Rat Race Choir, in attendance.
We simply setup drums, amps, PA on the porch facing Coney Island and the guys went at it.
Everybody in Roxbury was loving it.
Keg on the beach with dry ice along with a "minder" to cull the under age
Crickets were louder behind it.
After 40 minutes or so it was like the end of the word, boaters flashing lights in approval, however not so much for those Co-Op people.
8 or so cops cars show up "You guys have the call board lit up like a Christmas tree, please finish"
We let the cops help themselves to BBQ hamburgers and that was the end of it.
Yet, we are the devils....those BZ people are whacked.
Grandpas house is now a blown out plastic box, and parking lot, last one the north east side of Roxbury.
A Wall streeter lives there.
Zoe
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