Announcing the First Seven Miles Of NYC Open Streets

You’re getting an open street! And you’re getting an open-street! But the rest of you … not yet.

The city will start taking 100 miles of roadway back from drivers for socially responsible recreation with about seven miles, focusing on parks beginning on Monday, the mayor announced on Friday.

Of the total 7.2 miles:

• 4.5 miles will be inside parks: Fort Tryon (Manhattan), Flushing Meadows (Queens), Forest Hill (possibly Forest Park in Queens), Callahan-Kelly (Brooklyn), Grant (The Bronx) and Silver Lake (Staten Island).
• 2.7 miles will be adjacent to parks: Williamsburg Oval (The Bronx), Court Square (Queens), Carl Schurz Park (Manhattan), Highbridge Park (The Bronx), Prospect Park (Brooklyn), Stapleton Waterfront Park (Staten Island), Lt. William Tighe Triangle (Manhattan).

“The focus on streets near parks because of the warmer weather — we want to expand parks, if you will,” said the mayor, who said 40 miles of roadways would be opened up in May, towards the 100-mile goal. “That’s the beginning and we will expand from there.”

The mayor said the roadways would have “proper enforcement…with vigilant eyes,” but did not specify the exact role of the NYPD — and offered contradictory information about whether New York would continue to use the model of the NYPD’s original open space pilot, which was quickly scrubbed because it required too many cops, or whether the city would use the Oakland model of simply putting up “Closed to Thru-Traffic” signs.

“We don’t want to open up space and it becomes a gathering space or we open up space and there isn’t enforcement or cars can still access it,” the mayor said. “That was a critique I had about other parts of the country. This will be well protected and well regulated space, which is why we have to do it in phases. But a family will feel very, very comfortable.”

Department of Transportation Commissioner Polly Trottenberg was on the mayor’s press conference call, and addressed a question about how the roadways were chosen.

“We worked with NYPD and Parks and in some cases FDNY…to make sure we were not interfering with medical operations that are happening inside parks,” she said, adding that emergency vehicles and local deliveries would still be able access the roadways.

A reporter asked about why the mayor is waiting until Monday, given that the weather this weekend is expected to be nice.

“We have to set up to be effective…in terms of the physical structure and enforcement that is situated properly,” the mayor said. “We believe we can have everything in place by Monday. Enforcement is everything.”

The mayor’s initial list will certainly disappoint residents of Jackson Heights and Corona, who rallied for 34th Avenue — a redundant roadway that parallels Northern Boulevard — to be included. Two dozen neighbors created open space as a demonstration earlier this week, blocking cars at 90th Street, without the need for police.

Residents of the Rockaways were also disappointed by the initial list:

How can @NYCMayor completely exclude #Rockaways when people are already seeing out open space like the beach? We need STREETS closed to vehicles! We've already fought hard for parks closed to vehicles!

— Make Queens Safer (@MakeQueensSafer) May 1, 2020

And Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer, who has called for Broadway between Times Square and Soho to be opened for pedestrians, did not get her request on the initial list. But Trottenberg hinted that it may come soon, given her emphasis that “business improvement districts and neighborhood groups” would be involved in securing the open space.

The inclusion of the roadway along Carl Schurz Park in Upper Manhattan is particularly ironic, given that the mayor’s home — Gracie Mansion — is inside that park. The mayor was confronted last weekend by a Brooklynite who was angered that the mayor is regularly driven 11 miles from the mansion to Prospect Park so he can recreate. Perhaps he will now use East End Avenue.

The announcement could be seen as a small start, but it does come as the Department of Transportation has repeatedly said it is straining to fulfill its mission during the COVID-19 crisis, with a staff scattered by the virus.

“Our agency’s ability to do the requisite planning, traffic studies, and fieldwork needed for projects is significantly hampered,” spokesman Brian Zumhagen said on Thursday in a question not related to today’s announcement.

It’s also important to point out that Oakland’s much-lauded plan, announced on April 9, to create 74 miles of open streets that are off-limits to thru-traffic has resulted in about 10 miles of roads so far.