46th Street, between Greenpoint and Queens Boulevard (Photo: Queens Post)
May 13, 2020 By Allie Griffin
More Queens streets will be closed to traffic and opened to pedestrians as the coronavirus pandemic continues to ravage New York City.
The Department of Transportation (DOT) will open up 12 additional miles of city streets starting tomorrow as part of the city’s Open Streets initiative, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced today.
The City plans to open 40 miles of roadways for pedestrians and cyclists’ exclusive use by the end of the month as the warmer weather brings more and more New Yorkers outside.
Thus far, de Blasio has announced 21 miles across the city, including the routes revealed today.
“We want to make it easier for people to socially distance, particularly as the warmer weather comes on and the Open Streets initiative is helping us to do that,” de Blasio said at a City Hall briefing today.
Newly announced streets in Jackson Heights, Sunnyside, Long Island City and Flushing will open up beginning tomorrow.
Most streets will be closed to traffic between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. each day.
Local deliveries, pickups and drop offs and necessary city service, utility and emergency vehicles are permitted during the open street hours. Such drivers must drive at 5 MPH on the streets.
The City has already converted several Queens streets near parks and a stretch of 34th Avenue in Jackson Heights to pedestrians and cyclists use.
The mayor hopes to make 100 miles of city streets car-free during the course of the pandemic.
He announced the Open Streets initiative and 100-mile goal at the end of April after resisting weeks of pressure from the City Council and bike advocates to close roads to traffic during the health crisis.
The open streets will give New Yorkers with growing cabin fever amid stay-at-home orders additional space to get fresh air while following social distancing rules, supporters say.
The Queens streets, announced today, that will be shut to traffic each day from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. include:
34th Avenue between 78th Street and Junction Boulevard in Jackson Heights
Skillman Avenue between 39th Place and 43rd Street in Sunnyside
39th Avenue between Woodside Avenue and Barnett Avenue in Sunnyside
27th Street between Hunter Street and Queens Plaza South in Long Island City
5th Street between 46th Avenue and 49th Avenue in Long Island City
Roosevelt Avenue between 155th Street and Northern Boulevard in Flushing
Peck Avenue between 137th Street and Main Street in Flushing
In Sunnyside, 46th Street, between Queens Boulevard and Greenpoint Avenue, will close on Saturdays and Sundays between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.
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23 Comments
Closing 46th Street, between Queens Boulevard and Greenpoint Avenue, should be permanent. This should have happened years ago. It should be a pedestrian-only space. The space under the station has worked out nicely (except for the folks who’ve decided to live there, but that’s another issue.)
that’s the idea, force people to give up cars.
Imagine needing an ambulance but waiting for it get to you at 5mph. F this stupid city
Yes that’s exactly how it works ? you seem really informed
Well played. I guess these actually are Queens Streets for “All” if pedestrians cyclists cars delivery trucks and emergency vehicles can all access them equally and safely. We may consider renaming our org since we don’t support this. LOL.
Zurich has clean and timely public transportation. People can rely on it.
The “old city” is car free… because the streets are narrow, built before they knew there was another continent across the sea.
The “pedestrian area” does not have a line of 4 stories buildings packed with residents. It has only stores and cafes that close around 6pm
Zurich pedestrian area after 7 pm is empty. Likewise on Weekends.
If you want a no-car city, move to Amsterdam (what a great answer, eh? Whoever disagrees just move! Out of my land!)
You’re not in Zurich.
The mentality is very different.
This is America. The land of the haves and the have nots. This will is destined to fail bigly.
Such a stupid idea thanks for making the neighborhood worse, instead of doing things ass backwards how about removing these useless bike lanes for our first responders to drive through a lot easier.
Traffic Smurff. Queens has 21000 people per square mile. Zurich has 12000 people per square mile. Queens, by itself, is more dense than Zurich. Sunnyside is more dense than Queens as a whole. We don’t need to be a car first city. NYC is denser than every European city, and is also denser than Tokyo. If you want to drive everywhere, move to Dallas.
The more we cannot move about freely the more they can control the population.
Keep the bicycles off the streets designated for pedestrians. They are a bigger danger than cars. They have sent more people to the hospital than cars.
Another street grab by Blasio’s Transportation Alternatives.
How about some closed streets in Astoria!!!!!
We should all be concern of the censoring that sunnyside post is conducting in the comments section. Just because a community speaks the truth about handing bags of raw onions to people in desperate need because they didn’t RSVP using your google document is disrespectful and inhuman. The director os SSCS should be ashamed of herself you know who you are lady. How would you feel to be given a bag of raw ONIONS!! Shame on you, JVB ally.
This is great news! Nearly every park in Sunnyside has been closed during these warming months and kids and adults alike have been crammed together on narrow sidewalks while we have all this free road space available for the occasional car.
This is a great public health initiative, no doubt propelled by the good work at Transportation Alternatives.
I just heard the city is considering allowing restaurants to set up tables and serve food on these opened streets. Where is the Skillman Project on this? Are they petitioning for this or are they still protesting bike lanes? I want that Sanger Hall burger and a cold beer, momo from Dawa, fish and chips from Horgan, etc. The businesses should be clamoring for Skillman to be closed so they can open back up!
39th Avenue between Woodside and Barnett? 39th and Barnett run parallel to each other? Maybe it’s supposed to be Woodside between 39th and Barnett? In which case it’s close for like 100 feet? This makes no sense at all
Guess the city and the DOT didn’t think things through with 39th Avenue in Woodside.
39th Avenue is the only accessible road to 50th Street between Barnett and Skillman Avenues. By cutting off 39th Avenue, 50th Street becomes completely inaccessible for residents there without violating traffic laws during the day.
Transportation Alternatives uses this plague to expand bike lanes. Their stated goal is to rid the city of cars. They pretend the care about pedestrians.
How is it safe to combine the elderly, children, wheelchair users with bicycles? The City Council and Mayor still have free cars.
Make room by getting rid of the ‘affordable’ housing units.
We’ll need those extra pedestrian zones for people to sell pencils on if the economy doesn’t get going again soon.
prepare for the traffic!
Mua hua hua hua!
“This works in Europe!”
Yeap, European 15th century cities filled up with european mentalities and not 10 millions of diversity…
Who dares to compare Zurich with NYC?
Why 155 to northern on Roosevelt ? It’s residential housing . Nowhere near a park.