Transportation Alternatives, an advocacy group, led a walk-and-talk around the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway for a second week in a row Saturday to get the community involved.
“As we tour the BQE and physically engage with it, we’ll have opportunities for discussion,” said Kathy Park Price, the Brooklyn organizer with Transportation Alternatives. “Everyone’s feedback about the future of the BQE will be shared with the city and DOT.”
The group toured the central portion of the BQE. They started underneath it, near Nassau Street and Gold Street, and ended their tour at Atlantic Avenue.
Residents from surrounding neighborhoods signed up for the tour to learn more.
“Sadly, this has been talked about for over five years. I went to a meeting about this three or four years ago, and I think people are losing steam, like it’s confusing,” says Holly Flukinger, who has lived near the Brooklyn Promenade for more than 25 years. “There’s all sorts of conflicting information out there. And so I think it’s just a matter of getting people, keeping people involved.”
Transportation Alternatives is one of 17 community partners sharing feedback with the city on the designs.
Parts of the BQE, notably the triple cantilever, have been found to be deteriorating.
The city unveiled three design concepts Thursday.
Each design would repair the roadway and connect Brooklyn Heights Promenade to the waterfront park.
Two of the designs, titled “The Terraces” and “The Look Out,” would do so with a partial replacement of the cantilever.
The third design, referred to as “The Stoop,” would require a full replacement of the highway structure.
Former DOT Commissioner Hank Gutman, who lives in the area, was among those who participated in the tour Saturday.
“There are less extreme alternatives that would keep the highways safe and standing long enough to transition to a future in which we are less dependent on overweight trucks to deliver our goods and less dependent on private cars to get people around the city,” said Gutman.
The tour came after Mayor Eric Adams held a private meeting with elected officials analyzing the impacts of both two and three-lane configurations for the BQE Central — which is currently just two lanes.
Brooklyn Councilmember Lincoln Restler opposes a third lane, citing many of the concerns of residents.
“There is an asthma belt from Greenpoint to Bay Ridge for the people who live along the BQE. The noise, the vibrations, the division that it has created within our communities,” said Restler. “The idea that the Adams administration would expand it would add six million more cars and trucks running through Brooklyn Heights each and every year. It is not okay, and we will not allow it to happen.”
A City Hall spokesperson said in a statement, “We’re committed to prioritizing our bold climate goals and to building as narrow a roadway as possible, within federal safety guidelines.”
Transportation Alternatives has one more walk-and-talk planned, which will take place March 18, to tour the southern portion of the BQE.