The Times has a story about the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway that recounts the frustrations of drivers who use it–“It’s a nightmare”, it quotes livery cab driver Wilifredo Torres, who suffered a blowout that caused his fare to miss a flight–as well as of Brooklyn Heights residents:
New York Times: The highway has also been an irritating neighbor for Lucille Plotz, 85, of Columbia Heights and her husband, Charles, 90. Take, for instance, a recent afternoon inside their apartment. First came the vibrations, then a loud crash; her butter cookies toppled from the counter to the kitchen floor, and the radiator cover dislodged and fell onto a wooden chair.
“If it was properly maintained it wouldn’t be a bother, but now it’s beyond just maintenance,” Mrs. Plotz said.
The article quotes another Heights resident, Bo Rodgers, as saying that when trucks hit bumps “it sounds like a bomb going off.”
Unfortunately, as we previously reported, the State has cancelled environmental studies considering possible options to the present BQE structure that is cantilevered along the bluff below the Promenade and along the east side of Furman Street. Instead, the Department of Transportation has simply committed to make those repairs that are necessary to maintain safety. But, as the article points out, the highway has been under continuous repair since even before it was completed.
