Queens' DOT disasters

From the Queens Chronicle:

Construction to accommodate Select Bus Service at the confluence of Cross Bay Boulevard, Rockaway Boulevard and Liberty Avenue will not be complete until next month.

But residents and civic leaders are already saying things appear to be as bad, if not worse, then they have feared.

“This,” said a grim-voiced Vance Barbour of the Woodhaven Residents’ Block Association, “is our ‘I told you so.’”

When completed, what was three travel lanes and a service road headed northbound will become two; bus stops along the curb will be moved across the service road to a median; the travel lane adjacent to the median will become a 24/7 bus lane; and the left turn from northbound Cross Bay to Rockaway Boulevard will be eliminated, along with the turning lane, forcing cars — and trucks — to take more roundabout routes.

Bus stops already are being installed on islands on the southbound side, with machines selling SBS tickets not far behind.

Residents long have complained that the intersection forms a bottleneck during rush hour, backing traffic up for blocks.

The city’s Department of Transportation has asserted that reducing the number of lanes will improve traffic by helping create a more uniform traffic pattern along the entire corridor.

A more uniform lane configuration, along with the elimination of some left turns such as the one at Rockaway Boulevard, are designed to reduce the amount of lane merging that is said to be responsible for a great deal of congestion.

The construction is nearing completion, even over the constant and strenuous objections of residents and community leaders such as state Sen. Joe Addabbo Jr. (D-Howard Beach) and Assemblyman Mike Miller (D-Woodhaven).

“Nothing makes sense,” Howard Beach Resident Joseph Cerbone told the Chronicle. “We didn’t OK any of this ... They did just what they wanted to do. It was nightmare and they’re making it worse.”

From the Queens Chronicle:

In his letter, Avella added that there was a dangerous lack of signage for drivers at the location, which is an active construction area because of ongoing work for the bike lane. The senator also urged de Blasio and the DOT to abandon the bike lane plan and take up a different proposal for Northern supported by Community Board 11.

The office of Councilman Paul Vallone (D-Bayside) said he too has been in touch with city authorities.

“In response to the accidents and the community’s concerns, we reached out to the DOT to ask them to expedite the installation of signage and reflective panels to both inform motorists of the change in the traffic pattern and make the barriers more visible,” Vallone’s office said in an email.

Vallone’s opponent in November, Paul Graziano, said the bike lane has created “an extremely dangerous situation” and that the city shouldn’t install them on “what is essentially a highway.” Graziano, who lost the Democratic primary to Vallone but remains on the Reform Party line, is an urban planner who helped design the alternative bike lane proposal now backed by CB 11.

“You do not create something unless it’s well thought out, well planned and won’t be a negative,” he said.

In a statement, the transportation agency defended the barrier.

“These barriers did their job to protect those in the bike lane from accelerating turning vehicles,” the DOT said in an email last Friday. More signs, the agency said, are coming.

“In the next few days we will be installing additional safety treatments like reflective tape and flexible delineators that have been part of the design from the beginning of this project, to increase protection and awareness for all street users,” the agency said.

New bike lane causing car crashes

From CBS:

Last week, the city installed the bike lane on heavily traveled Northern Boulevard between Douglaston Parkway and the Cross Island Parkway. It’s protected by a concrete divider, which some some say has led to accidents, including one Thursday.

The problem, opponents say, is that some motorists traveling along Northern Boulevard don’t know there’s a bike lane ahead, as the road narrows from three lanes to two. The bike lane and concrete divider appear to come out of nowhere, critics say.

There are no warning signs posted.

State Sen. Tony Avella said the bike lane is dangerous and needs to be scrapped.

“I think this is a nightmare,” he said.

Avella said the city Department of Transportation installed bright orange cones in front of the concrete barriers just Friday morning.

The senator said his office has received reports of four accidents there since the lane was installed, reports he is still trying to confirm. He said you can see scrape marks on the divider from where cars have apparently hit it.

“All of a sudden, you’re coming around a curve, and you’re hitting a concrete barrier,” he said.

Avella said the community board in the area wants the bike lane replaced with a lane built onto an expanded sidewalk off the road. Trottenberg said that would take too much time and money and that the current bike lane provides safety for cyclists now.

Has DOT ever listened to a community board?

Flood barrier need questioned

From NY1:

Beautiful views off Breezy Point in the Rockaways could change; Connecting Queens all the way to Sandy Hook, New Jersey could be a barrier to shelter the city from flooding.

"This would save lives," said Bob Yaro of Storm Surge Working Group. "It will save tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars over its life in avoided flooding and disruption of the economy in the region."

Yaro's group calls not just for a barrier in the outer harbor, but also tying Queens to the Bronx near the Throgs Neck Bridge.

The group notes that New York lags behind London, the Netherlands, and even Russia.

"We're kind of standing down on the beach with our pants down around our ankles," Yaro said. "This is not how we want to protect this great city from these dangers."

And in a sign of its influence, a conference on the "urgent need for a regional barrier" is co-sponsored by the Port Authority.

But building a barrier isn't easy. The whole harbor system could cost $25 billion.

A rendering, seen in the video above, shows laying a highway on top to help pay, if it's given a permit.

Complicating matters further, Breezy Point is a private, gated community, whose residents aren't seen as exactly eager for interstate traffic to come through.

The group pushing the barrier says it's just an idea. Others question whether the barrier is needed at all.

Are sea barriers the way to go?

From the NY Times:

The technology of movable sea barriers, from Stamford’s modest flap gate to London’s mighty 10-gate system in the River Thames, has long intrigued engineers and planners contemplating a solution for low-lying areas of New York City. The notion is that such a system could one day block surges from Long Island Sound and the Atlantic Ocean into the East River and New York Harbor.

Now, in the aftermath of the devastating storm, one question is front and center: Should New York armor itself with steel and concrete at a cost of billions of dollars?

Experts whose barrier designs and studies from a conference in 2009 were issued on Monday in book form argue that anything short of sea gates would be a “Band-Aid” approach.

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has expressed wariness about the barrier proposal, saying he is not sure the gates would work well enough. Yet, it is clear that his administration’s view is evolving.