Downtown Brooklyn Group Has Plan to Make Area Pedestrian and Bike Friendly

By on December 23, 2019 10:54 pm in 11201, Downtown Brooklyn, Neighborhoods, News, Streets

The Eagle’s Lore Croghan reports on a plan, the “Public Realm Action Plan”, by the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership, a private, not-for-profit organization, for a “sweeping redesign” of the streetscape in our nearby neighborhood, where many of us shop. Contributing to the design, along with architecture and design studio WXY, was Bjarke Ingels Group, which has also proposed a design for relocation of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway below Brooklyn Heights.

The Eagle story quotes DBP President Regina Myer, whom you may remember in her previous role as President of the Brooklyn Bridge Park Corporation: “We want to go further than any business district in the city by reorienting streets away from cars and toward pedestrian, cyclist and mass-transit use.”

The image is of the proposed redesign of Fulton Mall, courtesy of Downtown Brooklyn Partnership.

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  • Jorale-man

    This could be an improvement. It all depends on the upkeep. Occasionally I’ll walk by the plaza next to Shake Shack and there’s a lot of loose trash blowing around and it’s not so inviting. There should be some investment in sidewalk cleaners if this was to work – literally a “sweeping redesign.”

  • Reggie

    Through the three BIDs that they operate, the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership already invests in street sweeping, including the plaza next to Shake Shack. The guys in the navy blue uniforms.

  • Mike Suko

    One always hears that bureaucracies are especially prone to fight “last year’s battles” (or last century’s), and this seems to be one of those. Somehow, the City Council has fallen for BS (just a little less plausible than Uber/Lyft/AirBNB) that motorized bikes help “new Americans” make a living and therefore should be minimally regulated. (That the Mayor has done nothing in this connection is explained by his overall incompetence and pique that he squandered enormous political capital by year 3 of his 8.)

    My point is that there is nowhere in Brooklyn where food deliveries play a larger role. Metrotech obviously is a serious business hub where many do not leave their desks and mostly “order in.” But as Livingston and Flatbush have “filled in” with 30-50 story buildings, the number of “delivered dinners” per year is surely millions in the area under discussion.

    People who’ve seen Amsterdam and think, “Wouldn’t that be nice here in the Heights and neighboring areas?” are ignoring the reality that “Revels” and 20 mph motor-bikes will wreak havoc on both pedestrians and non-motorized bicyclists.

    And that’s not even counting the emerging “industry” of motorized skateboards, scooters, etc.

    I never thought I’d feel “common ground” with motorists, but our streets and avenues are now positively Darwinian. The lack of meaningful traffic enforcement apart from parking is great for orthopedic surgeons … and equally awful for every other New Yorker.