Workers redeck the Gowanus Expressway. Plans to overhaul the road completely were cancelled due to budget shortfalls. Photo: NYS DOT

The state Department of Transportation announced yesterday the cancellation of plans to rebuild 5.3 miles of the BQE and the Gowanus Expressway. It wasn’t a new round of freeway revolts that killed these projects but the state’s busted transportation budget.

“The economic downturn has affected all areas of government and Transportation is not an exception; recent projections show insufficient funds to meet our infrastructure needs,” reads the official notice of the projects’ demise in the Federal Register. “The cost of the alternatives being evaluated do not fall within NYSDOT’s funding constraints.”

This marks a decided change of tone from the state DOT, which until very recently was calling the repairs “critical needs” for public safety, as the New York Post reported today. Together, the two projects could have cost between $2.3 billion for rehab work alone and $35 billion for the most expensive tunnel alternatives, according to NYSDOT’s estimates.

At Streetsblog, we’re not going to shed tears about a major highway project being cancelled or delayed, especially not while transit is being stripped off the Tappan Zee Bridge and the MTA is being forced to put necessary repairs onto straphangers’ credit cards. But it’s interesting that in the absence of any political will to put a price on driving, even infrastructure projects designed to benefit motor vehicles, are falling by the wayside.

Not that New Yorkers won’t still be paying for the BQE. Even without the reconstruction projects, these are expensive roads. The ongoing redecking of just the Gowanus — meant only to be an interim solution — costs around $680 million, according to the state. Canceling the major rehab could end up costing much more in the end if expensive upkeep stretches on for decades, though it would let the state kick the can down the road during a time of fiscal duress.

The situation would be different if new tolls were on the table. Putting a price on the BQE would require federal approval, but Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood has expressed a clear willingness to allow tolls on interstate highways where appropriate. Had tolls been on the table for the BQE and Gowanus, there would have been any number of different outcomes possible.

By reducing traffic, tolling the BQE and Gowanus would also reduce maintenance costs. If the tolls were set high enough, the lighter traffic load might even make engineers and politicians more comfortable with fewer lanes on the highways, cutting costs even more. A free road for drivers is an expensive road for taxpayers.

Tolls wouldn’t just cut costs, of course; they would also raise revenue. If the state wanted the toll to be a strict user fee, it could reinvest the revenue into the two highways. That might be enough for a cheaper tunnel option; a 1996 RPA report estimated the cost of a Gowanus tunnel at between $1.5 and $2.5 billion ($2.2 to $3.6 billion in 2011 dollars). That alternative, which would open up new land for development and knit neighborhoods back together, had widespread community support.

The toll revenue need not be used only for a highway project, especially if the tolls are already saving the highway system money. Investing some of the toll revenue in rail freight infrastructure could be a win-win, helping take heavy trucks off the busy expressways and cutting maintenance costs even further (it wouldn’t hurt to restore two-way tolling on the Verrazano, either). Bay Ridge commuters might prefer spending the money on the Triboro RX circumferential subway line rather than the Gowanus. Staten Islanders might prefer new light rail lines connecting them to New Jersey and the ferry.

Once tolls are part of the conversation, there are a lot of options for the BQE and Gowanus. Without them, we’re stuck with what we’ve got.

The Staten Island Advance ran an article last Thursday about a "perfect storm" of crushing Staten Island-bound traffic on the Gowanus Expressway and the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. To give you a sense of the frustrated tone of the article, it was entitled "21-Month Nightmare: Agency Offers Zero Solutions for Verrazano Lane Mess." Here's how it began:

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- A best man missed his nephew's wedding rehearsal.

A truck driver was forced to pull over and cool his heels.

Countless commuters rued that extra cup of Joe before leaving work.

And then there was the pizza delivery to a group of exasperated bus riders left stewing in the parking lot that was the Gowanus Expressway last Friday afternoon.

Experts say there's no way to fully manage the crush of rush-hour traffic expected to continue for the next 21 months while lanes are closed on the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge.

Island commuters don't care what the experts have to say.

Their bottom line: Fix this mess.

Otherwise, it will be a long, hot summer.

"I could have gone to Florida in as long as it took me to get home," fumed Grasmere's Marlee Tanenbaum, who was stuck for two and a half hours aboard an X2 express bus Friday evening. "It is so insane that it's unbelievable. I am outraged!"

If this isn't the perfect argument for why we need congestion pricing, I don't know what is. The fact that so many people are crushing onto the bridge shows that it is too cheap to travel over it. The toll is $9 (charged toward Staten Island, the direction of this jam), but that obviously is not enough to prevent this kind of traffic. Motorists want travel to be cheap and fast, but one who demands cheap travel can't turn around and complain about how slow it is.

Instead of using rational pricing to solve the problem, officials are horsing around with palliatives aimed at making it easier to drive, which of course will encourage more traffic. A Verrazano traffic working group made up of elected and agency officials managed to avoid the issue of pricing or tolls, but did come up with some ideas to speed up traffic without inconveniencing anyone. (It's magic!) Specifically: "An increased police presence, and the dispatch of traffic agents at certain Brooklyn intersections near the bridge, to help keep traffic moving smoothly, without backing up local neighborhood streets."

Prediction: None of these things are going to achieve the hoped-for increase in traffic speed. But congestion pricing -- with funds directed towards more and better mass transit -- should solve it just about instantly.

In fairness, more sensible proposals came from Councilman Vincent Ignizio, who suggested speeding up implementation of a fast ferry to the island's South Shore and fast-tracking the planned extension of the Staten Island Expressway's bus-only lane. More to the point, however, motorists' expectations need to be managed better. They need to be told that their commute can be more expensive, it can be done in a bus or a ferry, or they can remain stuck in traffic on the Verrazano. There are no other options.

Clearly, the bridge's $9 toll should be raised, if it's not doing the job. The Staten Island Ferry is already free, so maybe pay people 25 cents to ride it. I'm not even kidding. Better yet, impose congestion pricing in Manhattan, and fewer people will drive to Manhattan, leaving fewer people to be stuck fuming on the Gowanus.

You have to move fast to beat the turning traffic on Fourth Avenue.

DOT Deputy Commissioner for Brooklyn Dalila Hall faced some tough questioning from members of the public at a meeting on pedestrian safety on Third and Fourth avenues in Brooklyn on Saturday.

"Why should we have to run across the street?" demanded Melissa Torres, whose daughter attends PS 24 in Sunset Park, near the busy intersection of 38th St. and 4th Ave.

Sometimes running isn't enough. A third-grader was hit by a car two weeks ago as she crossed at the spot, where vehicles roar down a ramp off the Gowanus Expressway and make a left turn right into a crosswalk on Fourth Avenue.

That girl survived the crash, but Third and Fourth avenues have been fatally dangerous streets for many children -- like six-year-old Andry Vega, who was run over at the corner of Third Ave. and 46th St. last December, and four-year-old James Rice, who was struck and killed at the corner of Third Ave. and Baltic St. in February.

They were just two of the fatalities that showed up as blue crosses on the map of the Third and Fourth avenue corridor at the back of the auditorium -- interspersed with many, many red circles indicating crashes that resulted in pedestrian injuries.

The meeting, organized by the Community Education Council for District 15, was designed to give the public a chance to voice their concerns directly to DOT officials and to police. And the parents, teachers and students who attended made the most of it, requesting traffic-calming measures and better enforcement for specific intersections, like the one at 38th and Fourth.

According to Transportation Alternatives' Brooke DuBose, who made a presentation at the meeting, several residents marked trouble spots on the map, and representatives from Community Board 7 and the offices of various elected officials expressed interest in following up the meeting with further workshop and planning opportunities.

Representatives of the 72nd and 78th precincts, which cover the area, said that truck enforcement is a priority. In the 72nd, according to Sgt. Alfredo Rosario, summonses for trucks are up 50 percent over this time last year. He welcomed the input from the community on specific dangerous intersections. "It's actually very helpful to us," he said after the meeting.

Several of those present wanted more immediate action from the DOT to make crosswalks safer. "When a kid gets killed here, god forbid, then they'll do something," said Raymond Mercado, who lives around the corner from PS 24 and has two children in the school. He said he constantly sees near-misses as kids travel on the traffic-filled streets.

He and others wondered if the DOT needed to study the situation.

But the DOT's Hall said a new study, with all the time and money that entails, wasn't necessary. The completion of the Downtown Brooklyn Traffic Calming Report in 2004, she said, had been "seminal" for the agency. "It really brought traffic calming into the agency and made us think about streets in a different way," said Hall. Now, when the agency becomes aware of danger spots on streets, she said that they are dealt with in a different way. "Our toolbox has grown," said Hall.

That toolbox, she said, now includes traffic-calming measures like leading pedestrian intervals for lights at crosswalks, which allow pedestrians to get out ahead of cars and be more visible. She pledged to look into installing such an interval at the corner of 38th and Fourth.

But considering the DOT's record of implementing the traffic-calming proposals called for in the report, some in the audience were skeptical. Jim Devor, a Carroll Gardens resident, said he is still waiting for a promised neckdown to be installed at the corner of Smith St. and Second Pl., where he lives. And he suggested that because the Third and Fourth avenue corridor is home to many low-income residents, safety there is a low priority for the city.

"I don't think the accident data we have would be acceptable on First and Second avenues in Manhattan," said Devor. "The prioritizing of traffic over children is not acceptable."

The DOT's Hall countered, "The agency's priority is safety."

Photos: Sarah Goodyear