This week's journey. Why we don't have snow vacuums like Montreal. The alternate side parking holiday is finally over. NYPD says cold weather drove up subway crime — and more.
With fixes still up in the air, will the BQE become NYC’s own Big Dig?
New York is among the big cities around the country grappling with a crumbling problem: What to do with highways built more than a half-century ago? These cities face a stark choice — tear them down or replace them.
Detroit, Seattle, New Orleans, Baltimore and New York all feature highways built between the 1950s and 1970s, when traffic planners sought to make it easier for drivers to get from the suburbs to city centers.
But those structures weren’t designed to last forever, and they’re showing their age. None may be as pressing at the 0.4-mile section of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway known as the triple cantilever.
The section along the Brooklyn Heights waterfront was once considered an architectural marvel. Now, it’s being shored up with short-term fixes while the city figures out what to do next.
“Something has to be done, right? Doing nothing is not an option,” said Ian Coss, the creator of the “Big Dig” podcast about Boston’s notorious project to tear down an elevated highway downtown and build a new one underground.
WNYC’s The Greene Space is hosting a sold-out event with the podcast’s creators Tuesday night. You can sign up to watch the free livestream here.
The Big Dig took two decades to complete. It cost nearly $15 billion, making it the most expensive highway project in U.S. history. It became a cautionary tale for government officials seeking to do something ambitious with an old highway.
One of the directors on the Big Dig recalls later consulting for Seattle officials. The Seattle officials told him whatever he does, they didn’t want another Big Dig, according to Coss.
MediaNews Group/Boston Herald via Getty Images
The BQE has the potential to match — or even eclipse — the Big Dig in transit lore.
Under Mayor Eric Adams, the city’s Department of Transportation presented 13 options for fixing the triple cantilever. His administration spent two years collecting feedback from the public, including ideas for a larger section of the highway, stretching from the Kosciuszko Bridge in Queens to the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge in Brooklyn.
“If we do not undertake a major replacement or rehabilitation project in the near future, we will need to undertake disruptive, large-scale and expensive annual repairs and face potential operational changes to the highway,” former Transportation Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez warned. Residents have heard that type of grave warning about the BQE since at least 2018.
Now there’s a new mayor in town. The DOT is currently deciding whether to move forward with an environmental review process based on proposals presented during the Adams administration, or pivot to a long-term rehabilitation plan.
“We will not kick the can down the road,” current Transportation Commissioner Mike Flynn said. “Major work must be undertaken by the end of this decade or truck traffic will need to be diverted onto local streets to reduce weight on the structure — and every step must be taken to avoid that outcome.”
Curious Commuter
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“When will the elevators at Yankee Stadium be opened again? They were supposed to be fixed last month.”
- Jezzebelle from the Bronx
The latest update from the MTA is that the five elevators currently out of service for replacement should be back up and running by the spring of this year, ideally by the time the Yankees play their home opener against the Miami Marlins on April 3. The station serves the B, D and 4 trains.
There are 14 different stations where the MTA is actively replacing or adding new elevators. It's required because of a class action settlement that forces the transit agency to make an overwhelming majority of their subway stations ADA-compliant by 2050.
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We're also talking about...
Why New York City doesn’t just vacuum up snow. Montreal does it. Why did we have to deal with giant piles of snow sitting on the curb for weeks?
“We found that a lot of garbage got caught up in the machine.”
- DSNY spokesperson Vincent Gragnani on the challenge of vacuuming snow
Gateway work is back on. Construction on new tunnels under the Hudson River will resume next week now that the Trump administration has released more than $205 million in frozen funding that had already been approved by Congress.
Temperature dropped, subway crime rose. The NYPD is blaming the extreme cold for a 17% increase in major crimes in the subway system during the first five weeks of this year.
Immigration crackdown comes for buses. New York’s DMV has stopped issuing or renewing commercial drivers licenses to many immigrants in response to a Trump administration order. Unions say it could hamper school bus and MTA bus service.
