Make drivers chip in for transit? OMG, right?

Looks like at least one of Marty's friends isn't LOL.

Markowitz said the current rules reflect the proper balance between making the park accessible and keeping traffic flowing.

He said closing the park to cars during rush hour would create an "unbearable" traffic burden in neighborhoods south of the park. "That is not fair," he said.

"Not everybody can get to work on a bicycle," he said. "My opinions reflect the viewpoint of the great majority of residents of Brooklyn."

Today's rally starts at 5:00. Allow a few minutes to clear security.

• City Council Member Tony Avella: "[Avella is] an obscure pol, and attacking CP allowed him to grab attention while promoting his anti-tax agenda. But he may have gone around the bend, ranting about routine horse-trading for council members’ votes."
• Comptroller Bill Thompson: "The city comptroller has been mildly supportive of congestion pricing, though he’s always been careful to attach caveats ... Why take a bold stance on something that might never happen?"
• City Council Speaker Christine Quinn: "[S]he used last week’s vote to demonstrate leadership on a contentious issue ... Plus, wrapping her arms so tightly around CP also earned Quinn a big chit with Bloomberg..."
• Congressman Anthony Weiner: "[I]n the campaign, he’ll cast congestion pricing as Manhattan-centric and elitist, like Quinn. Weiner was thrilled to see her so far out front."

And don't forget Marty Markowitz, whose most notable contribution to the congestion pricing discussion has probably been his vehement opposition to new bridge tolls. 

On a related note, the Daily Politics reports that Deputy Mayor Kevin Sheekey issued a not-so-subtle warning on the radio this morning that state pols will be judged on where they come down, and could be supported or opposed accordingly in future races.

Whether or not the plan passes in Albany, how will congestion pricing influence your vote for the next mayor?

Here's the breakdown by borough:

• Manhattan: 73% - 23%
  
• Bronx: 57% - 39%
  
• Brooklyn: 51% - 46%
  
• Queens: 58% - 40%
  
• Staten Island: 55% - 42%

In keeping with previous polls, 89 percent say traffic congestion is a “very serious” or “somewhat serious” problem. The majority still isn't convinced, though, that pricing funds will used for public transportation improvements, according to Quinnipiac.

Only 43 percent of voters say it is "very likely" or "somewhat likely" that congestion pricing funds will be used to improve mass transit, while 54 percent say this is "not too likely" or "not likely at all."

Not sure how it squares with the approval ratings above, but the poll also says that, by a 58 to 36 percent margin, "New York City voters agree that congestion pricing would unfairly tax people who live outside Manhattan." Manhattan voters disagree, 52 to 43 percent. Says Q Polling Institute Director Maurice Carroll: “Again, it’s Manhattan against the world."

The poll also shows Police Commissioner Ray Kelly as the top choice for mayor at this point, followed by Congressman Anthony Weiner and Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz.

When the City Planning Commission upzoned Brooklyn's Fourth Avenue in 2003, it was hailed by some as a breakthrough. Borough President Marty Markowitz trumpeted Fourth Avenue as "a grand boulevard of the 21st Century." Residential development would reshape this urban speedway, the thinking went, from a pit-stop for cabs to a stately corridor of mid-rise residences -- Brooklyn's answer to Park Avenue.

In the past two years, as the dust cleared from disputes over building heights and provisions for affordable housing, Fourth Avenue's transformation has sped along. The first wave of new residential construction has hit the market, and dozens more properties from Flatbush Avenue to 15th Street are in various stages of development. But the early returns are discouraging for anyone who hoped to see a walkable, mixed-use district take shape here.

The arrival of the Novo, a sidewalk disaster, made claims of a Fourth Avenue renaissance seem premature.

One new apartment building, the Novo, looms fortress-like over the playground next door, while another, the Crest, greets passersby with man-sized industrial vents. A new hotel, Le Bleu ("a haven of style, elegance and fine living"), meets the sidewalk with a parking lot fit for a suburban dentist's office.

Welcome to the new Fourth Avenue -- the future of Brooklyn.

While all of the new developments boast of their proximity to "neighborhood gathering places," and the "cozy" restaurants, shops, parks and public amenities of "vibrant Park Slope," developers have made no apparent effort to create a cozy, vibrant street life around their own projects.

Instead of transforming Fourth Avenue into Brooklyn's next great neighborhood, these new developments turn their back on the public realm, burdening the street wall with industrial vents, garage doors and curb cuts. That projects like these get built begs the question: What can be done to safeguard streets from bad buildings at the outset of development cycles?

Front and center at Le Bleu: Le parking lot.

The easy way out is to say Fourth Avenue was already a lost cause. Look at the six lanes of traffic rushing to and from Flatbush Avenue (plus two parking lanes and left turn bays). What sort of ped-friendly boulevard could flourish here without taming traffic first? But long stretches of nearby Atlantic Avenue manage to provide a decent walking environment and a dense variety of retail activity despite similarly heavy traffic volumes. New bars, restaurants, and stores have even popped up on Fourth Avenue's smaller lots and street corners, adding to a patchwork of veteran retail establishments. If small entrepreneurs believe Fourth Avenue can attract people on foot, why have big developers capitulated to the cars, trucks, and gas stations that overwhelm the avenue's pedestrian environment?

The Sheep Station is one of the new establishments setting up shop on Fourth Avenue street corners.

"At the time, they were making rational decisions," says Ken Freeman, a broker at Massey Knakal who has sold several properties along the corridor. "Whether residential was going to work was still a question mark, so why take the risk on retail?"

The effectiveness of government incentives may be limited. In the 2003 rezoning, the City Planning Commission included a generous allotment for retail uses, setting a maximum floor-area-ratio of 2.0 for commercial space. "I don't believe City Planning could have done much more to encourage mixed-use development," says Freeman, but that wasn't enough to overcome developers' initial hesitation.

In districts undergoing rapid transition, Freeman explains, developers generally avoid taking the mixed-use plunge without first dipping their toes in the water and building pure residential projects. Though he also notes that Two Trees, the developer behind most of DUMBO, turned that wisdom on its head by practically giving away retail space and using the resulting amenities to lure residents.

Freeman was a self-described skeptic about retail on Fourth Avenue until last spring, when he solicited offers for a property at the corner of Third Street occupied by Parkside Auto Service. "I imagined it as an office building," he says, "but we went to market and immediately we had offers well above asking from people who wanted to build retail."

Now that the perception of risk attached to mixed-use development has diminished, the next round of construction on Fourth Avenue should be a step up from what we've seen so far. "With the amount of new residents coming to the Fourth Avenue corridor, it is only natural that commercial would follow," says Joyce Kafati-Batarse, a broker at Prudential Douglas Elliman who specializes in new building development.

500 Fourth Avenue will have a commercial tenant on the ground floor, and it won't be an Olive Garden.

Those smaller restaurants and stores appearing on the avenue are harbingers of a burgeoning market for retail. "Now that we've established that there's a need, you're going to see a lot more of the cafés, bars, and shops," says Katafi-Batarse. Commercial rents have jumped from $25-$35 per square foot to $35-$50 along the Fourth Avenue corridor, and she expects them to grow further.

As a result, bigger players are now committing to mixed-use projects. Developer Isaac Katan will put a commercial tenant on the first floor of 500 Fourth Avenue, a 12-story building between 12th Street and 13th Street designed by ubiquitous Brooklyn architect Robert Scarano. (Real estate bloggers speculated that an Olive Garden had claimed the space, but the rumor proved false.)

It remains to be seen whether developers and architects will make mixed-use projects that actually enhance the pedestrian environment. But if there's a lesson to be learned from Fourth Avenue's recent history, it may be that gaining the ear of a well-connected, civic-minded broker like Freeman can sometimes yield better, quicker results than appealing for government action. Since he saw the offers for Parkside Auto, Freeman has served as an evangelist of sorts, urging many of the developers he works with to include retail in their Fourth Avenue projects. He believes the corridor can fill a need that the boutique-y Fifth Avenue cannot.

"Fourth Avenue is not constrained by the 20-foot-wide brownstone building footprint," he told me. "A different type of retail could end up there." He gave as an example Party City, a party supply store with a few Brooklyn locations. It's no Home Depot, but Party City is too big to fit anywhere on Fifth. Using Fourth Avenue's wide lots to accommodate such tenants could cut down on car trips made by Park Slope residents, enticing more of them to walk down the hill.

Vacant and under-utilized lots still provide opportunities for human-scale infill.  

Over the long haul, plenty of other factors will determine Fourth Avenue's future as a walkable, mixed-use corridor. The fate of Atlantic Yards and congestion pricing, still fairly clouded by uncertainty, could either exacerbate the current traffic problem or lead to a more ped-friendly and transit-oriented allocation of street space. But for the immediate future, at least, we can expect developers (some less villainous than Bruce Ratner) to dictate events.

Even as momentum builds for retail use, however, the current cycle of development shows signs of petering out. With the real estate market generally on the downswing, the window of opportunity for investment in Fourth Avenue is closing. Developers are driving stakes in the ground now to beat the clock and take advantage of the 421-a tax incentive that "expires" in June. (Actually, they will still be able to capture the credit if they build 20 percent affordable housing on-site, but in the current market that may be enough disincentive to prevent new construction.)

"The next development cycle may be ten years away," says Freeman. Once the current round of construction is complete, Fourth Avenue will still be a work in progress, but several gaps -- especially the ones closest to subway stations on Ninth Street and Union Street -- may be plugged with mixed-use infill. And, Freeman suggests, there's still a chance for the developers of the Novo and the Crest to redeem themselves: "I do think there's an opportunity to retrofit."

Photos: Ben Fried

Yesterday we wondered if the city might be convinced to reconcile its vision of a sustainable city with its anti-urban parking policies. We'll mark this one in the "no" column.

Late last week Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz was busted by Uncivil Servants for parking on the sidewalk in front of Borough Hall during a meeting in which DOT unveiled its long awaited Downtown Brooklyn Transportation Blueprint -- check out Priority Initiative #9 below (or download the entire list)...

Regardless of DOT priorities, it turns out that parking on sidewalks is only illegal for drivers who aren't the Borough President or members of his staff, as the Daily News reports:

The Parks Department has struck a deal with Markowitz, allowing him and his staffers to park on the plaza along the east side of Borough Hall and even on the sidewalk on Joralemon St. next to a busy newsstand, Markowitz's office said Tuesday.

Markowitz's office argued it is perfectly legal for him to park on the busy sidewalk.

"We have an agreement with the Parks Department that is authorized by signage along that side of the building that allows permitted vehicles to use that space," said Markowitz spokesman Mark Zustovich.

The Parks Department said they could not comment on the exact location of Markowitz's car the night of the hearing, but confirmed they had recently granted Markowitz the right to park on the flagstone walkway to the east of the building - but not on the plaza behind Borough Hall where Markowitz's staffers used to park.

Markowitz last year tried to block a prohibition on cars in Prospect Park, until DOT did it anyway.

As Markowitz is flirting with a mayoral candidacy, livable streets advocates are getting a preview of how their agenda would fare under Mayor Marty. All together now: Fuhgeddaboudit!

Side note: Here's a reason to hope for a Hillary Clinton presidency -- Marty Markowitz, Ambassador to Trinidad.

Photos: Uncivil Servants

When the Traffic Congestion Mitigation Commission meets today, it is expected to deliberate four proposed alternatives to Mayor Bloomberg's original congestion pricing plan. While Chairman Marc Shaw writes that that the commission "may choose to modify," "combine elements" or "put forward a wholly different plan," debate has already begun in the media, focused mostly on the proposal to add tolls to all free bridges on the East and Harlem Rivers.

Under that plan, a $4 toll would be imposed on all crossings into and out of Manhattan, 24 hours a day, with higher tolls for trucks. The plan would reduce vehicle miles traveled (VMT) by 7 percent -- qualifying the city for $354 million in federal funds -- while raising an estimated $859 million annually for transit.

Pols including Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz and City Council Member John Liu are adamantly opposed to tolling the remaining bridges. Liu -- who chairs the council's transportation committee -- pre-empted today's TCMC discussion with another salvo, via the Daily News.

"You can't seal off Manhattan like that," said Liu (D-Queens), who supports congestion pricing. "To think of Manhattan as a castle surrounded by a moat will not get anybody anywhere."

The News points out that in 2006, "Although 557,043 vehicles used the nine free bridges spanning the Harlem River, only 494,576 vehicles crossed the free Brooklyn, Manhattan, Williamsburg and Queensboro bridges."

Another proposal, as outlined with the others in a 72-page commission report (pdf), would operate similarly to the mayor's plan, but would move the pricing boundary to 60th Street and remove the $4 fee for trips originating within the zone. It would also raise parking meter rates, eliminate the resident parking tax exemption, and impose a $1 surcharge on cab rides that start and/or end within the zone. Estimated annual revenues for the "Alternative Congestion Pricing Plan" are pegged at $520 million.

The other two plans are the "Combination Plan," which would reduce VMTs by just 3.2 percent and is apparently not considered a viable option as written, and the odd-even license plate scheme, which would raise zero dollars for transit and will ideally end up but a gleam in Richard Brodsky's eye.

Meanwhile, maverick advocate Ted Kheel grabbed some prime op-ed space in today's Daily News to push his plan to double the $8 congestion charge while making transit free. And a new Quinnipiac Poll -- released, true to form, just ahead of the congestion commission meeting -- finds that 60 percent of New Yorkers support congestion pricing to improve transit, though you still wouldn't know it from the headlines.

The good news for Mayor Bloomberg is that he's likely to win some sort of "congestion pricing" plan by the spring now that the Assembly speaker, Sheldon Silver, is on board with developing a plan to reduce Manhattan traffic by charging a fee to drivers. This is noteworthy because Mr. Silver has played the recurring role of obstructionist to some of Mr. Bloomberg's boldest ideas during the past six years.

We won't know what congestion pricing really means until much closer to the March 31 deadline for final approval from the City Council and state Legislature. We do know there's no chance the ultimate agreement will look much like the original proposal for using hundreds of cameras to charge $8 a car for all cars below 86th Street — with a rebate for any tolls drivers paid to enter Manhattan.

That initial idea actually gives a free ride to drivers who enter Manhattan via the Triborough Bridge, Midtown Tunnel or Battery Tunnel (already exactly $8 round-trip with E-Z Pass) and a big discount to New Jersey drivers (who pay $5 round-trip) with E-Z Pass. The big losers under the original plan are those drivers from Westchester, Brooklyn and Queens who currently travel free on bridges.

The final deal will likely put a bigger burden on New Jersey drivers while adding some fee for drivers who currently pay nothing to enter Manhattan. The city council is the biggest obstacle, because 30 of the 51 members hail from Brooklyn and Queens. They understand clearly how the initial "congestion pricing" plan targets their constituents.

"Congestion pricing could be three blocks with some cameras around them," quipped one person involved in the process who doesn't particularly like any of the ideas currently being floated. "But there will be something the mayor can call 'congestion pricing' by the time this is done."

Despite vocal opposition from Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz and City Council Member David Weprin, Congestion Mitigation Commission Chair Marc Shaw has insisted that East River bridge tolls remain on the table, with Assembly Member Richard Brodsky applauding them as "a step in the right direction". What remains to be seen, tolls or no tolls, is whether the plan that emerges from the commission (now meeting as of this writing) will pick up or lose support in the council, where 20 members (plus one) were warm to the original concept back in August. Then there is the $354 million dollar question of whether the federal government can also call the final version "congestion pricing."

And, of course, what of the payoff for Silver? The Sun speculates:

Mr. Bloomberg's determination to do something about the unacceptable traffic that frustrates everyone trying to move around Manhattan is benefiting from a combination of technology and timing. Cameras can now easily read license plates to ensure drivers pay up, far different from just a few years ago when actual toll booths were needed. And there are genuine environmental benefits, making the general concept difficult to oppose in the year that green has gone mainstream.

In congestion pricing, Mr. Bloomberg seems finally to have stumbled upon a bold idea Mr. Silver will embrace. As a shrewd negotiator who's mastered the patience of waiting until the last minute, Mr. Silver will surely extract some concessions — such as more cops on the street to prevent double parking and crack down on drivers who created gridlock by blocking the box. 

A few of the steps under consideration:

• moving the northern boundary from 86th Street to 60th Street;
• "drastically" reducing the number of cameras to cut administrative costs and "mollify civil libertarians";
• retooling the toll offset proposed for New Jersey drivers;
• tolling the East River bridges (over the objection of Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz).

The Daily News says the panel is also thinking about eliminating the $4 fee for trips within the congestion zone, and creating additional, smaller zones in downtown and Midtown.

This sentence really jumped out of Engquist's article:

In place of cameras, much higher fees for on-street parking, and perhaps a new tax on garage parking, would be imposed to raise revenues and discourage driving in the central business district.

So, what does that mean? Is the Commission considering replacing congestion pricing (as defined by the federal government) in favor of more stringent and expensive parking policies? If so, will the feds still give New York City a $354.5 million grant for that?

For a refresher on the hows and whys of the original pricing proposal -- which addresses many, if not all, of the commission's concerns -- see Streetsblog's four-part interview series with PlaNYC architect Rohit Aggarwala.

In the meantime, here's the Crain's article in its entirety.

Traffic plan detour
Congestion panel may move boundary, make other changes to win support

BY ERIK ENGQUIST

The commission reviewing Mayor Michael Bloomberg's congestion pricing proposal is likely to overhaul it by moving the northern boundary from 86th Street to 60th Street and simplifying enforcement.

According to people involved in the process, members of the panel believe the changes are necessary because polls and hearings show that support for the plan is shaky and hinges on whether it would generate enough mass-transit funding.

"Because of the public hearings and the issues raised by the Assembly and others, a whole range of issues is being looked at," says Marc Shaw, chairman of the commission. "The overall desire is to find a way to reduce congestion and do it in a way that doesn't have a negative impact on the economy."

The 17 commission members, appointed by city and state lawmakers, are expected to make other changes as well to increase revenues, make the fee scheme fairer to city drivers and ease privacy concerns.

The panel is awaiting projections on the impact of possible changes but appears certain to drastically reduce the hundreds of cameras proposed, many of which were to be used to track vehicles within the congestion zone. Shedding cameras would mollify civil libertarians and help slash administrative costs-initially projected to eat up 40% of revenues-to 25% or less, freeing up more money for transit projects. Better bus and subway service is essential to winning the approvals needed from the City Council and the state Legislature.

In place of cameras, much higher fees for on-street parking, and perhaps a new tax on garage parking, would be imposed to raise revenues and discourage driving in the central business district. A 60th Street boundary would eliminate the fee for drivers who stop short of midtown and ease fears that commuters would treat residential streets above 86th Street as park-and-rides.

The New Jersey problem
A thornier matter is how much to charge suburbanites who drive into the city, especially New Jersey residents, whose congestion fees would be entirely offset by their Hudson River tolls under the mayor's plan. City lawmakers, whose support is crucial for any plan to be adopted next year, consider it unfair that revenues would come entirely from their constituents.

"Key issues for legislators will be [the amount of] revenues raised for the mass-transit budget, and equity," says Kathryn Wylde, who represents the City Council on the commission and is president of the Partnership for New York City. "They cannot swallow having some people pay a charge based on where they live, and other people, particularly non-New Yorkers, pay nothing."

But hitting toll payers with a congestion fee might discourage so many from driving that toll revenues would plunge for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates the Holland and Lincoln tunnels, and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which runs other tunnels and bridges. Both authorities rely on toll money to fund debt obligations.

"It's an issue," says Mr. Shaw, a former first deputy mayor for Mr. Bloomberg.

City, Long Island fight looms
The question of whether to let Long Island commuters avoid congestion fees could spark a battle between their Republican senators and Democratic Assembly members from the city. Under the Bloomberg plan, these drivers' Midtown Tunnel tolls would offset their $8 daily fee.

Indeed, each modification to the proposal will threaten its delicate balance.

"Changing the plan will mean revisiting all the concessions and considerations involved with the MTA and Port Authority in particular, but also the state Department of Transportation, the state of New Jersey and the jurisdictions of Long Island and Westchester," says Ms. Wylde. "It's just not that simple."

For example, tolling the East River bridges would sabotage pricing's political support in Brooklyn. "I will not support any aspect of congestion pricing if tolling of the bridges is in it," says Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz. "That's off the table."

Nevertheless, Mr.Shaw says it "is something that's being looked at."

State law requires the commission to finish its work by Jan. 31, so pressure will intensify in the coming weeks. "At some point, it has to be 'Pencils down' on the research," says commission member Andrew Darrell, regional director of advocacy group Environmental Defense. "And we'll have to move forward with a plan."

The Daily News reported yesterday that, along with the recent extension of car-free hours in Central Park, Dept. of Transportation officials proposed closing Prospect Park's Manhattan-bound East Drive to cars during evening rush hour this month but the plan was squashed by Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz:

Sources said city officials were poised to cut Prospect Park's hours last week as well - but that the plans were scuttled at the last minute by Brooklyn's own cheerleader, Borough President Marty Markowitz, who has long opposed banning cars from Prospect Park due to traffic concerns.

"It was a done deal. It was supposed to be both parks," said a source. "But Marty Markowitz blocked it."

Sources said city officials had been planning to ban cars on Prospect Park's East Drive in the evening so that, like Central Park, there would be morning hours on one drive, evening hours on the other.

"Everyone signed off on it, and then, boom," said the source.

Transportation Department officials declined to comment on Markowitz's role.

Markowitz spokeswoman Laura Sinagra said the borough president was never given a formal proposal to sign off on but that his long-standing position remains unchanged.

"Our historical position has been that further limiting hours would result in unacceptable traffic backup," Markowitz said in a statement. "The current hours are appropriate to the needs of the many in our borough who must rely on these roads to get to work and school.

This news is disappointing. Markowitz and his staff have been increasingly vocal and helpful on "Livable Streets" issues in recent months. Granted, they still use the public plaza around Brooklyn Borough Hall as their staff parking lot, so perhaps the Prospect Park stance should not be seen as a surprise.

A knowledgeable tipster submitted this gem to UncivilServants, the web-based watchdog for government parking abuse in New York City. The yellow Porsche Carrera, above, was spotted parked in front of a fire hydrant on the east side of Seventh Avenue, in Park Slope, Brooklyn, between Sterling Place and St. John's Place at about 7:30 pm on Sunday, July 29. On the dashboard, a Dept. of City Planning placard ensures that the windshield of this little beauty is unlikely ever to have a parking ticket placed upon it. A Patrolmen's Benevolent Association card sits atop the parking placard for good measure.

We can't possibly know who was driving it at the time but the Porsche, the tipster says, belongs to City Planning Commissioner Dolly Williams.

Parking in front of fire hydrants, it turns out, is a rather minor item on this uncivil servant's rap sheet.

Though she is Brooklyn's one and only representative on the New York City Planning Commission, Williams has been barred from participating in Kings County's most important recent land use processes. After the Brooklyn Paper outed Williams' $1 million investment in Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner's Nets basketball team in August 2004, Williams was forced to recuse herself from any official role in the project. Then in February of this year, Williams was removed from the Gowanus Canal rezoning process after the Brooklyn Paper pointed out that she owns land within the area that was to be rezoned. With Dolly Williams on the Planning Commission, Brooklyn has no voice in these important projects.

The Brooklyn Paper reports on the most recent incident:

Questions about a possible conflict of interest emerged after the planning commissioner told acquaintances that she "absolutely" supports the residential redevelopment of the Canal zone. Insiders were quick to point out that Williams's company, A. Williams Construction, is based on Third Avenue near Sackett Street - an area that will be prime real-estate someday.

"She was working the room," said one person who attended the Community Board 6 meeting where Williams "was telling everyone that the area would have to be rezoned. She let everyone believe that was speaking as a commissioner, not a property owner who would make millions of dollars if she could build condos on her land."

Williams was appointed to the City Planning Commission by Brooklyn Borough President and likely Mayoral candidate Marty Markowitz. Of course, Brooklyn Paper has also reported that Dolly is one of Marty's big campaign contributors. She gave the $4,950 maximum.

As the sign says on the BQE, "Welcome to Brooklyn: Like No Other Place in the World!"

Tomorrow evening the transportation committee of Community Board 6 is meeting to take up DOT's 9th Street Safety and Bike Lane plan. The meeting will be at 6:30 pm at Old First Church, 729 Carroll Street at 7th Avenue. Park Slope Neighbors and Transportation Alternatives have generated nearly 400 letters of support for DOT's plan. Still, it will be important for Livable Streets advocates to show up and make their presence known. Speaking of letters of support, here is an important one:

May 13, 2007

Dear Borough President Marty Markowitz:

I led my neighborhood in a successful endeavor to make 9th street a safer thoroughfare for both pedestrians and vehicles in August 2005. Your support at that time made a huge difference (the result that had the greatest impact was the new traffic light installed at 10th street that slows traffic entering the 9th st intersection). 

There is a new initiative to make changes to the street that further fulfills on making 9th street safe. I am referring to the DOT plans to reduce the two lanes to one and adding bike lanes and a meridian in the middle.  Having looked at the proposal, I see that it is a safety win/win for pedestrians and vehicles and not only support the plan myself, but believe that the 1200 people that signed the 2005 petition would support this step toward safety and traffic calming as well. 

I request your support once again in urging DOT to move forward with this improvement.  Thanks.

Sincerely,
Konrad Kaletsch
XXX Ninth Street
Brooklyn, NY 11215

Photo: Aaron Naparstek, August 2, 2005, 8:10 am

As we've reported here on Streetsblog, the Department of Transportation has put forward a thoughtful and comprehensive plan for making one of Park Slope's most dangerous and crash-prone streets safer for pedestrians, cyclists and motorists. Unfortunately, a small group of mostly car and brownstone-owning 9th Street residents with quite a bit of influence on the local Community Board are organizing vigorously against the plan. They call themselves the Ninth Street Block Association.

Here is what I find remarkable about this group: When two 5th grade boys were mowed down by a landscaping truck at Third Avenue and 9th Street in February 2004, the Ninth Street Block Association was nowhere to be found. When a 77-year-old neighborhood resident was run over and killed by a contractor's truck at Seventh Avenue and 9th Street in August 2004, the Ninth Street Block Association had nothing to say about that. When a sedan went through the front door of Dizzy's Diner at Eighth Avenue and 9th Street in July 2005, again, the Ninth Street Block Association was AWOL. It took a resident named Konrad Kaletsch and the owners of Dizzy's to organize a 1,200 signature petition drive to get DOT to address the fact that the rate of car crashes, injuries and fatalities along the 9th Street corridor was way beyond normal.

Yet, now that a traffic safety plan has finally been put forward, the Ninth Street Block Association is out in force. Why? Because they are deeply concerned that DOT's pedestrian safety and bike lane plan will limit their ability to double-park, they don't like the idea of bicycles using "their" street, and they don't believe that DOT did enough to consult their group before putting the plan forward (never mind that this group showed a complete lack of interest as pedestrians were being knocked down like bowling pins up and down their street). 

Don't let this most base form of NIMBYism win the day. If you live in the neighborhood or regularly use 9th Street, send a fax right now.

Well, I think it's a very complicated issue, but, you know, we'll need to look at it and discuss it with the mayor and discuss it with the members of the conference. The concept of charging money to come to the center of a business district is something that is new to this country, especially in a city like New York. But, again, I would like to see what the proposed benefits are, and I'd like to see what the impact on business is projected to be.

Representative Anthony Weiner:

While I applaud the mayor for focusing on a long-term sustainability plan for the city, in this case the cure seems to be worse than the disease. We must look at innovative ways to face the challenges created by the city's own success, but a regressive tax on working middle-class families and small-business owners shouldn't be one of them.

Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz:

While I remain open to it, any plan must ensure equality among the boroughs, include exemptions for commuters traveling for health and employment reasons, alleviate parking problems -- particularly in those Brooklyn neighborhoods closest to the tunnel and bridges -- and direct generated revenues to improvements in our public transportation system.

I applaud the mayor's proposals to improve mass transit, since better public transportation -- including an expansion of bus service in neighborhoods not served by subways -- is essential for a congestion pricing plan to potentially work. I look forward to reviewing the plan as it develops with the necessary exemptions and requirements.

I wonder if it is another hidden tax on working people. I worry about people who need to use their cars to get to work.

Nassau County Executive Thomas Suozzi:

People's first reaction is they don't want to pay. But getting them to switch to mass transit benefits us all.

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn:

Whether you're for it or against it, it's a serious proposal and it deserves serious attention and that's what it will get from the council.

Council Member Michael E. McMahon, Staten Island:

It is surprising that such a bold vision for New York's sustainable future would not include a strategy for attacking the region's greatest source of traffic and air pollution. It is clear that truck traffic is increasing more rapidly than this City can handle, and, unchecked, the consequences could be disastrous. We urge the mayor to expand on the vision he laid-out today to adequately address truck traffic and freight movement as soon as possible.

Council Member David Weprin, Queens:

You're not talking about wealthy people, $8 a day is an enormous charge for those type of people and something that could really hurt them financially.

Council Member John Liu, Queens:

People drive to work in Manhattan for the most part because taking a local bus for a half hour to the nearest subway and then riding the subway for an hour is not a real option.

Ninth Street is very broad. It's got two wide travel lanes going in each direction and a lane of curbside parking on each side. DOT, I've been told, believes that 9th Street has "excess capacity," especially up towards the Park. In other words, the street is much wider than is needed for the number of vehicles that actually use it.

Car-free moments on 9th Street above Seventh Ave. are not hard to find.

Overly wide streets often tend to encourage speeding and create dangerous conditions. The intersection of one-way Eighth Avenue and 9th Street is a well known hot spot. In July 2005 a sedan went through the front door of Dizzy's Restaurant after making an ill-considered left turn on to Eighth Avenue. With a busy subway entrance and a sidewalk café right there, "I expected to see bodies strewn about the sidewalk when I came outside," said Dizzy's owner Matheo Pisciotta. Miraculously, no one was hurt.

Dizzy's Restaurant after a sedan came through the front door for brunch, July 13, 2005.

After that incident, a 9th Street resident named Konrad Kaletsch teamed up with Ben and Matheo, the owners of Dizzy's, to launch a petition drive for safety improvements along 8th Avenue and 9th Street (pictured above). They collected 1,187 signatures and even got Borough President Markowitz pushing DOT to make some fixes.

When cars aren't coming through the front door, Dizzy's is a Livable Streets posterchild.

Parts of the proposal that DOT is offering tonight appear to be in direct response to the community concerns put forward two years ago. Specifically, the community asked DOT to install left-turn lanes on 9th Street so that motorists wouldn't be so far away from the crosswalk they were turning in to.

So very much unlike DOT's March 15 one-way plan, today's DOT proposal isn't being dropped on the comunity from completely out of nowhere. It has been in the cooker for a couple of years as part of the package of Greater Downtown Brooklyn Transportation Improvements (PDF) that emerged from the fabled Downtown Brooklyn Traffic Calming Project. Likewise, the bike lanes are part of a comprehensive, long-term, citywide bicycle plan which aims to install more than 200 miles of new bike lanes throughout the city and create better connections to city parks, in particular.

Could DOT be doing a much better job of including community stakeholders in the actual planning process? You bet. But it is nice to see the agency responding to real concerns rather sending in a traffic engineer with solutions to problems that we don't have.

Photos: Aaron Naparstek

Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Senator Chuck Schumer argue that New York City risks losing its place of global pre-eminence in a Wall Street Journal editorial yesterday. The editorial is a response to growing conventional wisdom that says London is overtaking New York as the world's leading financial capitol. In the editorial, available online only to subscribers, Bloomberg and Schumer say that there is much the city can learn from its British counterpart.

One lesson not mentioned in the editorial, which reads mainly as a push to reform the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, is the role that long-term urban planning, quality of life improvements and agressive traffic reduction measures have played in London's ascent.

For London's Mayor Ken Livingstone, projects like congestion charging, banning cars from Trafalgar Square and the creation of the London Climate Change Agency, aren't just about altruistic environmentalism. "Ken's a very savvy marketer. He knows that these initiatives make London a more attractive place for big companies to set up shop and attract employees," an official at Transport for London told me.

Today's Guardian reports that macro environmental issues now inform everything that London's Mayor does:

Ken Livingstone, Mayor of London, is these days possessed of one great idea. Climate change, and how to avert it, consumes him. It now informs all his decisions on transport. It is top of his agenda for social housing and new building developments. He reads about it in his spare time. He talks about it to anyone who will bend an ear and he will travel to the ends of the earth if necessary to cut deals with other politicians, to steal the best ideas from other cities and to communicate with anyone the urgency and scale of the problem.

Though Livable Streets issues weren't mentioned in the Bloomberg-Schumer editorial, New York City's business community is increasingly aware of their importance. As Kathryn Wylde, president of the Partnership for New York City has said, "The gridlock on New York City's streets has become a brake on the city's economy. She warns, "It is going to be increasingly difficult for New York to market itself as a place where you can get the most done in the least period of time with the best workforce if we're not able to solve the congestion problem."

Meanwhile, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, a possible 2009 Democratic mayoral candidate, is off to visit the World Travel Market expo in England to sell UK travel groups on package tours that include a trip to Brooklyn. Marty told the Daily News, "Tourism is one of Brooklyn's biggest and most vital growth sectors, and I'll do whatever it takes to show the world the beauty of our borough."

There are a couple of things, of course, that Marty won't do to enhance the beauty of his borough. He won't support London-style traffic reduction measures. He won't stop parking his SUV and about a dozen other vehicles on the pedestrian plaza, technically park land, outside of historic Borough Hall. And he won't push the city, state and developer Forest City Enterprises to do smart, thoughtful, long-term planning around the massive "Atlantic Yards" project.

Welcome to Brooklyn, Brits. Perhaps the traffic congestion will remind you of what it used to be like in London. Don't forget to look to your left when you step out into the street.