Brooklyn, NY – Assemblyman Dov Hikind penned a letter to Governor Andrew Cuomo on Monday requesting the Governor meet with him on Ocean Parkway to discuss the impending traffic changes slated to begin in the coming months. The letter comes on the heels of the rally hosted by Assemblyman Hikind to save Ocean Parkway, which featured hundreds of outraged residents and several elected officials who spoke out about the dangers posed by these impending traffic changes.
“The proposed changes eliminating certain right turns from the mainline of Ocean Parkway, north and south, will wreak havoc for all parties affected,” Hikind wrote. “These changes will force more traffic onto the service roads and pose a tremendous risk to the safety of the residents.”
Hikind added, “In addition to the elimination of these right turns, the NYS Department of Transportation’s plan will eliminate left turns from the service road at nine different locations. Motorists who wish to cross over Ocean Parkway or travel on the mainline will now be forced to remain in the service road for many blocks all within the span of a mile.”
Assemblyman Hikind went on to explain that by remaining on these service roads for an extended period of time, traffic would bottleneck on the same blocks that are home to a plethora of schools, synagogues, apartment buildings and community service centers. “Our community is one of the most densely populated areas in New York City. To divert traffic not only onto the service roads, but to the surrounding streets, will endanger thousands of residents,” Hikind said.
“Governor, I implore you to come and visit the area with me to witness what potential harm these proposed changes will have on Ocean Parkway and its residents,” Hikind added. “In the meantime, please suspend these changes from taking effect so we can save lives and enhance people’s safety and quality of life.”
{Matzav.com}
Maybe a law should be proposed that any change the DOT wants to make must be approved by the community board. In addition it would make a lot of sense that after a change DOT access the change every three months up to a year to see if the change worked as planned.
I will give an example where the DOT just made a change but the change will G-D forbid be the cause of accidents. Going to Queens getting onto the Jackie Robinson Pky from Jamaica ave. DOT took away the left turning lane and made that lane and the next lane a direct lane onto the Jackie The third lane on the right became a right turning lane but also the lane that can go straight to Jamaica Ave. This lane is a big problem because cars can very easily get in this lane without realizing that they must turn right or go onto Jamaica Ave. and then cut into the lane going onto the Jackie.