Friday, June 15, 2012

Problem with wrong solution


From the Queens Chronicle:

Between 47th and 50th streets on Skillman Avenue, several trucks double-parked to unload — sometimes three trucks in a row — but traffic moved smoothly and residents did not seem to notice their presence early Tuesday morning.

However, a resident at the Community Board 2 meeting on June 7 said the truck traffic has become an issue, causing unwanted noise and air pollution.

Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer (D-Sunnyside) has been working on alleviating the problem.

“Queens Boulevard and Northern Boulevard are not too far away, and those roads are more appropriate for that kind of traffic,” he said Tuesday.

Van Bramer said he has reached out to the Department of Transportation asking them to place a “No Truck Route” sign at an appropriate location. He said his office has also contacted the 108th Precinct and the Queens North Traffic Enforcement Division with the hope of improving policing and traffic enforcement in the area.

A DOT spokesperson said in an email, “The truck routes and rules for truck activity are set forth in the City’s Traffic Rules, and no portion of Skillman Avenue is a designated truck route.”


If the problem is double parked trucks making deliveries, how will a "no truck route" sign help, Jimmy?

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Trucks loading and unloading to supply the businesses which line Skillman Ave have been going on since there was a Skillman Ave.

How could Northern Blvd. be "more appropriate for that kind of traffic" when the traffic is delivering 50 cases of Snapple to a local store on Skillman Ave?

Anonymous said...

Referring to trucks making deliveries in an article about illegal truck traffic is just bad reporting. That doesn't mean there is not illegal truck traffic using this street as a shortcut.
The thing is police don't want to bother enforcing the law on a street like this because they won't want to waste their time pulling over some trucks that are legitimately on the street making deliveries.

Here is another article that doesn't mention local deliveries as the problem.
http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20120614/sunnyside/quiet-skillman-avenue-besieged-by-truck-traffic-residents-say

Anonymous said...

The thing is police don't want to bother enforcing the law on a street like this because they won't want to waste their time pulling over some trucks that are legitimately on the street making deliveries.
----------------------------------
The Police Department has neither the time or the personnel to deal with this. Precint strngth has been cut to more than half of what it was just ten years ago in every pct across the city. And what few cops there are today are kept busy with endless red tape, paperwork and meaningless notifications from even the most mundane assignment. Have a cop just handle a found wallet, and he/she is off the street for 2 or 3 hours, thanks to the department's archaic system.

Anonymous said...

"The Police Department has neither the time or the personnel to deal with this."

Bullshit!
The NYPD issued 48.000+ tickets to bicycles in 2011, compared to about 25,000 truck violations.

This makes sense since we see so many more bikes than trucks on the streets *sarcasm*. And those 250lb bikes are obviously much more dangerous than the puny 20,000-80,000 lb trucks on the road.

Anonymous said...

Forgot to cite source.
http://transportationnation.org/2012/02/15/nypd-issued-almost-50000-bicycle-tickets-in-2011/

I was actually googling for cell phone ticket numbers but found the above first. A crackdown on cell phones yielded 6200 tickets in one day! No manpower my ass.

Anonymous said...

I can stand at an intersection and in one hour see two or three trucks slide through just as the light turns red.

I can see two or three bikers go THROUGH a red light in one minute.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...
"The Police Department has neither the time or the personnel to deal with this."

Bullshit!
The NYPD issued 48.000+ tickets to bicycles in 2011, compared to about 25,000 truck violations.

This makes sense since we see so many more bikes than trucks on the streets *sarcasm*. And those 250lb bikes are obviously much more dangerous than the puny 20,000-80,000 lb trucks on the road
-----------------------------------
48,000 bike summonses CITYWIDE in one year? Do you really think that is alot? A number like that could be done in a MONTH citywide, with a proper amount of cops assigned to such enforcement. The fact remains, we need more cops to enforce what everyone here wants enforced.

Anonymous said...

Sure. Now how many speeding violations do you think could be issued DAILY if that was the primary focus?
Sorry, people cruising through a red light on a bicycle are mostly a danger to themselves. People doing 40 mph on residential streets are a serious danger to everyone around them.
Try checking out Streetsblog, it's linked on the list of links on the QC page, to see how often people are killed by speeding, reckless, and otherwise out of control drivers. Sorry, but despite all the red light blowing, people on bicycles are not killing pedestrians several times a week. Not even close.

Seriously, check this out
http://www.streetsblog.org/category/special-features/carnage/

Anonymous said...

Sure. Now how many speeding violations do you think could be issued DAILY if that was the primary focus?
Sorry, people cruising through a red light on a bicycle are mostly a danger to themselves. People doing 40 mph on residential streets are a serious danger to everyone around them.
Try checking out Streetsblog, it's linked on the list of links on the QC page, to see how often people are killed by speeding, reckless, and otherwise out of control drivers. Sorry, but despite all the red light blowing, people on bicycles are not killing pedestrians several times a week. Not even close.
---------------------------------
Folks, let's stay with the original topic, which was double parked trucks.

Anonymous said...

Actually the original topic is illegal truck traffic. Double parking was only brought up because of bad reporting.

Anonymous said...

Actually the original topic is illegal truck traffic. Double parking was only brought up because of bad reporting.
--------------------------------
Ok..................