We've got a few different bikeway-related reader submissions that have come over the wire recently. First up, Dave "Paco" Abraham sends this picture of a two-way barrier-separated bikeway going in on Furman Street by the downtown Brooklyn waterfront. Furman is on the route of the Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway, and with Brooklyn Bridge Park opening piece by piece, it's already pretty common to see people biking in both directions on this three-lane speedway underneath the BQE cantilever.

Paco says it looks like the new bikeway is only going in between Joralemon Street and the entrance to the yet-to-open Brooklyn Bridge Park bike path, about a block away. We have a request in with DOT about the scope of this treatment. Extending it along the full length of Furman would plug one of the last major greenway route sections that feels unsafe to bike on between Greenpoint and the Columbia waterfront district.

Photo: nycbikemaps

Remember this from last week? It's where the East River Greenway caved in at 72nd Street. The Parks Department told us they would have it fixed this week, and here it is, all patched up. Parks didn't tell us, though, whether there's any attempt underway to determine whether all the other sinkholes on the greenway are symptoms of a larger problem.

The final update comes to us from Ed Ravin. Actually it's more like an epic saga with a happy ending. I'll let Ed tell the story:

For years, the East River bridges have been the stepchild of emergency phone coverage. Up until the mid 1990s, the Brooklyn Bridge had four emergency phones hooked up to two regular telephone lines.  If one of the lines failed, all the phones on that side of the bridge would go down with it.

Starting in the early 1990s, the city began installing shiny new emergency phones along the city's highways.  These phones are solar powered and use the cellular network to reach emergency dispatchers, so they have no wires and are much more reliable than the old land-line based system. But as was typical of many infrastructure improvements in the 1990s, the phones were installed only in places where motorists could get to them. Bicyclists and pedestrians, especially on crime-prone East River bridges like the Williamsburg Bridge, were on their own.

A (broken) emergency call box on the Queensboro Bridge in 2001, conveniently placed for easy cyclist access. Photo: Ed Ravin

Adding to the problem was that the old landline-based emergency phones were maintained by the Fire Department, while the new cellular phones were installed by the NYPD's Communications Division. The Fire Department wanted to get out of the phone business (as seen later in the 1990s, when the streetcorner fire call box became an endangered species), and were no longer installing callboxes. So the NYPD was asked to put callboxes on the East River Bridges. They said they'd be happy to do so but needed some other city agency to fork over the money for them.

As with all things for the East River Bridges, it turned out that NYCDOT was the "responsible" agency and we weren't going to get any new phones on the bridges until the DOT paid for them. A cellular phone appeared on the Brooklyn Bridge walkway after some unfavorable press coverage, and that was it. When the Manhattan Bridge path was first opened, there were no callboxes at all, and the Queensborough Bridge (see photo) had not had a working callbox for many years.

Starting in the early 2000s, callboxes have been turning up one by one on the Williamsburg and Manhattan Bridges, but still, there did not seem to be any consistent plan.

I recently moved to Brooklyn and began commuting regularly over the Manhattan Bridge, and was pleased to see that both the north and south paths had two cellular emergency phones, one at each anchorage. And it was a welcome surprise in mid-July when two more phones sprouted up at the towers. It appeared that someone had looked at the needs of the bridge and was finally implementing a plan.

Manhattan Bridge, 2010: Reliable emergency call boxes finally have bike-ped spaces covered. Photo: Ed Ravin

Today I ran into a work crew installing a fifth phone on the Manhattan Bridge's north path, right in the middle over the river. I was told that there are now 8 or 10 phones on each East River Bridge, all of them ringing through to 911 should you ever have cause to pick one up. It's great to see that the emergency needs of the city's bicycle and pedestrian-only places are, finally, part of the plan.

Phase two of the Flushing Avenue project maintains the city's commitment to a two-way bike path, but Brooklynites will have to wait a few years to get it. Image: NYCDOT

Last night, NYCDOT's Ted Wright presented a revised design for the Flushing Avenue bikeway to the transportation committee of Brooklyn Community Board 2. The new version preserves plans for a fully-protected, two-way bike path while leaving room for two-way bus service and auto traffic. Because the revised design requires more complex construction work than the original, however, Brooklynites will have to wait a few years before that phase of the project gets built. In the meantime, DOT plans to lay down a less-robust interim project, which the committee endorsed unanimously.

The interim project will extend the two-way bike path on Williamsburg Street West -- which is protected from traffic by jersey barriers -- onto the north side of Flushing, up to Washington Avenue. (To orient yourself, check out this map.) Between Washington and Navy Street, the plan calls for buffered bike lanes on each side of the street. Parking on the north side of the street will be removed.

Phase one will add buffered bike lanes west of Washington Avenue. Image: NYCDOT

The original concept for Flushing Avenue called for a two-way, protected bike path all the way to Navy Street, preserving curbside parking while eliminating the eastbound traffic lane. DOT could have built that out as an in-house project this summer, but adjusted its plans after Navy Yard businesses and local residents objected to the new traffic pattern.

The city hasn't backed away from its commitment to build a safe connection for bicyclists and pedestrians on Flushing, but it will take longer to get there. Phase two of the new plan for Flushing calls for widening the sidewalk on the north side of the street by six feet. The wider sidewalk will then accommodate a two-way bike path and pedestrian space. Since expanding the sidewalk along the entire street entails changes to drainage and grading, phase two will have to proceed through New York's multi-agency construction bureaucracy. Wright estimated that it would take two to four years to build.

After Wright's presentation, Alfred Chiodo, a representative of Tish James's office, said the council member is "very happy with the plan," including the two-phase build-out. Shani Leibovitz, a Navy Yard vice president, also said her tenants were pleased with the plan, which doesn't alter traffic patterns or bus routes (one westbound bus stop where about 35 people disembark daily, at Ryerson Street, will be removed).

John Eddey, representing Navy Yard tenant Steiner Studios, was still unwilling to fully endorse the second phase of the project, prompting Wright to plead with board members to remember the core goal behind the development of the Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway -- to build a continuous route that gives people of all ages a safe path to walk and bike.

"I want to ask you guys to support the greenway as much as possible," he said. "Lets not shoot it down before we get it up and running." The committee voted unanimously in favor of both phases, asking DOT to return with specifics on phase two at a later date.

The bike lane extension proposed for Vanderbilt Avenue would add some order to a chaotic intersection. Image: Google Maps

The proposal was crafted in response to a request from the committee, which asked DOT this spring to study gaps in the local bike network identified by CB 2 member Mike Epstein. Despite the fact that the Vanderbilt bike lane would eliminate no parking and leaves traffic patterns basically unchanged, members felt uncomfortable proceeding without informing the Fort Greene Association and the Society for Clinton Hill, neighborhood groups that had received invitations to last night's meeting but sent no one to attend. (The Fort Greene Association had also endorsed Epstein's earlier request.)

DOT's Keith Bray reassured the skittish members that the agency would publicize the project before implementation. Nevertheless, the committee chose not to render a verdict on the proposal.

What it's like to bike on Flushing Avenue now. Photo: NYCDOT

The concept that DOT initially presented for the project was well-received by this CB committee a few months ago, but met with resistance from Navy Yard businesses and locals who insisted on preserving two-way traffic flow on Flushing. If you want to help keep up the long-term momentum for a continuous Brooklyn greenway and improve safety for cyclists and pedestrians right now, don't miss this meeting.

It gets started at 6 p.m. Here's where to go:

St. Francis College
180 Remsen Street
1st Floor Board Room

It's a small room, so I recommend getting there as early as possible to find a comfortable spot.

A map of potential greenway routes and east-west connections in Sunset Park. Image: UPROSE

Determining a buildable greenway route in Sunset Park is a complicated proposition. The waterfront is an active industrial district filled with the sort of facilities that pose logistical hurdles for safe walking and biking. West of the BQE, the greenway route will have to negotiate obstacles like the 65th Street rail yard, the Brooklyn Army Terminal, and the active freight rail corridor on First Avenue. It won't be easy, but as Brooklyn Greenway Initiative planning director Milton Puryear told me last night, it's a place where you've got to think big.

A finished greenway in Sunset Park would bring huge payoffs. Sunset Park has one of the highest walk-to-work rates in the city, and a major new waterfront park is slated for the Bush Terminal Piers. So in addition to providing a route along the waterfront, the greenway project is a chance to connect the residential areas east of Third Avenue to the new park and the waterfront's industrial job center, using safe walking and bicycling paths. There's already a well-established base of local support for creating those connections: The United Puerto Rican Organization of Sunset Park (UPROSE) started holding public workshops about the greenway and waterfront access in 2005.

The main focus of last night's workshop was to get ideas from residents about where the greenway should go. Participants split up into groups and then presented to the whole audience.

Mapping out a greenway route. Photo: Dan Wiley, office of Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez.

As for the greenway route, a few groups proposed some heavy duty walk-bike infrastructure for the trickiest segments, including bridges spanning the 65th Street railyard and the Gowanus Bay, and an elevated path over First Avenue.

Soledad Gaztambide, transportation justice coordinator for UPROSE, said she was encouraged to hear people ask for routes that stay close to the water. "I'm really hoping that they put the main route along the waterfront, and First and Second," she said. "We want to have an industrial waterfront but we also think it could be multi-use."

DOT is working to build parts of the greenway footprint as soon as possible (see Kent Avenue and Flushing Avenue), but it will be a couple of years before the ideas from yesterday's workshop show up in a final plan. The greenway master planning process, which continues with a workshop at the Red Hook Recreation Center on April 13, is slated to wrap up in 2012.

Image: NYCDOT [PDF]

DOT is aiming to implement the new bike path in July, and Brooklyn greenway project manager Ted Wright told CB 2 members to get ready for more greenway planning in the meantime. The agency is holding a series of public workshops, starting next week, for the full 14-mile length of the proposed greenway, part of a master planning process that officials expect to run through 2012. The first workshop, open to anyone who wants to come, will take place at Brooklyn Borough Hall on March 25. (You can RSVP with the Brooklyn Greenway Initiative, which is sponsoring the workshops with RPA.)

The Flushing Avenue project would construct a two-way bike path from Williamsburg Street West to Navy Street, separated from traffic by a nine-foot planted median. Vehicle traffic would travel in one westbound lane, between two lanes of parking. Only three curb cuts providing vehicle access to the Brooklyn Navy Yard would interrupt the bike path along the length of the project. Passengers on the B69 and B57 would disembark at bus bulbs constructed in the center median, with eastbound bus routes diverted to Park Avenue.

Despite the current tendency of motorists to speed on Flushing, the high volume of trucks, and the absence of a bike lane, more than 300 cyclists ride there on summer weekdays, according to DOT counts. "People are already using it for recreation and commuting purposes," said DOT Bicycle Program Coordinator Josh Benson. With the recent completion of the Sands Street bike path and the Kent Avenue path, the attraction of Flushing as a bike route to the Manhattan Bridge and Brooklyn Bridge Park is expected to grow substantially.

Committee member Mike Epstein said the plan provides "a top-notch protected bikeway" on a street in desperate need of safety improvements. "It's important to look at this as a traffic-calming project" that will benefit pedestrians too, he said.

Epstein also requested better bicycle connections from Vanderbilt Avenue, where the bike lane terminates south of Fort Greene, and Bedford Avenue, where the erasure of a 14-block bike lane segment has left cyclists without a continuous route to the Williamsburg Bridge.

Benson said DOT would look into both ideas, but that adding a connection from Bedford would be hindered by ongoing construction work on Flushing Avenue. The segment of Flushing between Bedford and Williamsburg Street is still being reconstructed, he said, because the Department of Design and Contruction encountered an underground stream.

After the presentation and the unanimous vote in favor, I caught up with Milton Puryear, head of the Brooklyn Greenway Initiative. Following last year's drawn out fight over the Kent Avenue bike lane, this early vote on the greenway precursor for Flushing Avenue was a friction-less affair. He was smiling almost the whole time we talked.

Velazquez has played a big role in advancing the greenway, securing $14.6 million in federal funding for its construction. Staff members at her Brooklyn and DC offices were not available to confirm or comment on the bike lane opposition.

If it wasn't painfully obvious already, this can no longer be dismissed as your typical bike lane flap. To counter the opposition and show support for critical safety improvements, be sure to show up tomorrow at the full Community Board 1 meeting about the bike lane (211 Ainslie Street; sign up before 6:15 p.m. to speak). And if you haven't signed on yet to Transportation Alternatives' e-fax campaign, now is the time. More direct, in-person appeals will certainly be necessary, and we'll keep you posted about organized actions going forward.

Want to work the phones a little this afternoon? Check here for contacts at Velazquez's Brooklyn office, and here for City Council members Yassky and Reyna. They need to hear from constituents who don't want to see Kent Avenue take a step backward toward the dangerous bad old days:

Last time we checked in on the Columbia Street section of the Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway, construction was in full swing. Now, along much of the path in Carroll Gardens and Red Hook, the orange barrels are gone and new plantings are taking root. Streetfilms' Clarence Eckerson snapped these shots last week, noting that about 40 new trees have been planted on Columbia between Atlantic Avenue and Degraw Street. The paths and plantings have completely changed the feel of the street, he tells us.

This section of the greenway is a "temporary" path that may be widened in the future. The current right-of-way varies between 13 and 20 feet and may expand to 30 feet, pending negotiations with the Port Authority, says Milton Puryear of the Brooklyn Greenway Initiative. We have a request in to DOT to find out when this phase of construction is slated to wrap up officially. For now, enjoy more of Clarence's pics.

The view south from Atlantic Avenue. The white stripe demarcates a parking lane.

New street trees have been planted on the other side of Columbia, too.

During an epic bike tour of the city yesterday that stretched from the Bronx to Brooklyn, StreetFilms' Clarence Eckerson, Jr. took these shots of the future site of Brooklyn Bridge Park. The Brooklyn Greenway, which received a vote of confidence from Community Board 1 on Tuesday, will run through the park along the edge of the pier. The demolished structures on the right were still standing when Clarence shot this video last year, documenting a tour of the Greenway's path.

Says Clarence: "Made me realize with all the sadness of congestion pricing failing, there IS plenty of great stuff going on in the city."

A tighter shot comes after the jump.

On Tuesday night, Community Board 1 in north Brooklyn voted 39-2 to support adding a separated bike path to Kent Avenue, a truck route through Williamsburg and Greenpoint. The path will be part of the Brooklyn Greenway, which is slated to follow the waterfront from Greenpoint to Red Hook when complete.

What makes the overwhelming "Yes" vote especially noteworthy is that the greenway section on Kent Avenue will displace hundreds of on-street parking spaces. "That was one of the biggest hurdles, getting a community to accept a loss of parking," says Milton Puryear, director of planning for the Brooklyn Greenway Initiative. "For people who have cars that’s a lightning rod issue."

...and how it would be allocated under the proposal approved by CB1 on Tuesday. (Rendering by the Regional Plan Association.)

Two other community boards had to vote on the greenway, but parking was only affected in the CB1 district. To defuse the expected opposition, the Greenway Initiative identified side streets -- usually former industrial blocks converted to residential use -- with areas where on-street parking could be "reclaimed," such as defunct loading zones. Offsetting the loss of 500 parking spots on Kent Avenue was seen as necessary to gain community approval.

"When it first started off a lot of people didn’t think it was doable from a political point of view," says Puryear, noting that it was already an unconventional idea to add a bike path and green space to a designated truck route. "But after years of engagement, it began to evolve as something that people really wanted."

A number of factors fueled that desire. For one, the 2005 rezoning of 175 blocks in north Brooklyn left many in the community feeling like they had been denied adequate green space. "We received no open space in return for density," says Teresa Toro, transportation chair of CB1.

When the Brooklyn Greenway Initiative and the Regional Plan Association organized a public workshop about the greenway last May, residents saw a way to make up for what they had lost before. "[The participants'] responses were, 'If we have to find some parking spaces elsewhere, we should do that,'" says Toro.

Improved waterfront access was another big draw. "Kent Avenue, since it was repaved, has become something of a speedway," says Toro. By narrowing the crossing distance on Kent, the path will make the street -- and the truck route -- less of a barrier to the water.

At the meeting on Tuesday, a broad coalition of bike advocates and open space advocates supported the plan. Only one person voiced displeasure at the loss of parking.

About $9 million has been secured for the Brooklyn Greenway so far, mostly from federal grants. With the final community board vote settled, the project is now in the hands of DOT. Before construction begins on the Kent Avenue section, Toro says, DOT has indicated they will "move" some of the on-street parking and stripe down the greenway footprint.

Coming so soon after the demise of congestion pricing, the community board vote was "a shot in the arm," says Toro. "It shows that communities here in the city can still do a lot to create livable streets."

Images courtesy of Milton Puryear / Brooklyn Greenway Initiative / Regional Plan Association

The Brooklyn Greenway Initiative, a citizen-driven project that began with a handful of insane visionaries picking up trash and planting flowers beside a BQE off-ramp, is taking shape on Columbia Street.

Notice the space for greenery between the sidewalk and the curb. Plans call for the park to connect Greenpoint to Red Hook.

Photos: Clarence Eckerson

On Saturday, over 100 cyclists turned out for Brooklyn Greenway Initiative's annual ride. For nearly a decade, they have been working with numerous community & government groups to bring a Hudson River-style recreation path from Greenpoint to Sunset Park. In the next few years, much of the 15-mile route will finally become reality.

The tour highlight: It was the first public bike tour to be allowed to ride on the piers the future Brooklyn Bridge Park will occupy. Riders enjoyed vantage points of lower Manhattan few have ever seen. Along with Streetsblog reporter Sarah Goodyear, StreetFilms' Clarence Eckerson, Jr. was there with his camera. Afterwards, he produced this two minute video essay.

It was a dreamy spring day on the Brooklyn waterfront as more than 100 bikers set out to trace the proposed route of the Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway.

Starting at the end of Manhattan Avenue in Greenpoint, cyclists were treated to views of the soon-to-open East River State Park as well as an unprecedented spin around the piers that will be part of the future Brooklyn Bridge Park. Watch a StreetFilm showing these rarely seen views here. 

Milton Puryear (right), vice chair and director for planning of the Brooklyn Greenway Initiative (BGI), led the ride and did a great job of explaining the group's vision for the future of Brooklyn's waterfront. A key part of that vision is the provision for separate lanes for bikers and pedestrians, so that, as Puryear explained, "Cyclists can keep their heart rate up and pedestrians can lower their blood pressure."

The challenge facing the greenway's advocates is considerable. Considering the multitude of owners and interests at work along these now prime pieces of real estate, coordinating the planning and construction of a world-class greenway is an extraordinarily complex undertaking. Community Board 1 will be holding a planning workshop on May 24th at 6pm where residents of Greenpoint and Williamsburg will be able to brainstorm about planning options for that section of the greenway.

Several riders commented on how quickly we got from Greenpoint, where condo towers are sprouting right and left, down to the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge. It's easy to imagine how the construction of the greenway would provide a vital physical and psychological connection between the rapidly developing neighborhoods of Williamsburg and Greenpoint and the more established residential neighborhoods to the south -- Dumbo, Brooklyn Heights, Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens and Red Hook. Right now, these neighborhoods feel very distant from each other, in part because the only way to travel between them is by the G train or by car on the massively overcrowded BQE. But on a bike, cruising along the East River, you can become aware of how close together they all really are -- and how integrated the waterfront's recreational opportunities could become with smart development.

The BGI has a spiffy new map showing the proposed route as well as the current preliminary route along the waterfront. Contact them and get a copy at info [at] brooklyngreenway [dot] org. Then go out and ride it yourself.

Photos: Sarah Goodyear 

When I first met these guys in the Spring of 2002 they were going out on weekends planting tulips and picking up rubbish alongside a BQE off-ramp. The Sunday morning that I ran into them, that was all that they could do to make the Greenway a reality -- just get together as a group of volunteers, clean up some trash, and plant flowers. That was it. That was the Greenway. There was no office or federal funding. The Economic Development Corporation wasn't knocking on their door.

Today, the Greenway Initiative looks from the outside like a healthily-funded and well-oiled machine. Yet, as Brian, Milton and Meg have shown for well over ten years now, the vision will not become reality without strong community advocacy. Here is your chance to participate and make a difference:

The New York City Economic Development Corporation is rezoning piers 7-12, including Columbia Street, which is part of the proposed Greenway route. There is a public meeting this Thursday, October 12th at 6pm at Long Island College Hospital, corner of Hicks St & Atlantic Ave (use the Hicks St entrance & ask security guard to direct you). Greenway supporters need to be there.

It is very important that Greenway supporters tell EDC that the rezoning must be expanded to include the areas recommended by the Brooklyn Greenway Initiative, and that the open space plan for the west side of Columbia Street should be included as part of the scope of the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS).

More information and the Brooklyn Greenway Initiative's statement are available here.

EDC's proposal is available here. 

If you can't make the meeting you can send written comments to:

Ms. Meenakshi Varandani
Assistant Vice President, Planning
New York City Economic Development Corporation
110 William Street, New York, NY 10038