The Brooklyn Paper reports that City Department of Transportation project manager Tanvi Pandya told local residents at Monday evening’s community meeting on BQE reconstruction that testing by DOT shows that the cantilevered stretch of the highway that parallels Brooklyn Heights and sits partially below the Promenade can last another ten years before repairs would demand the BQE’s complete closure over that portion in order to do vital repairs. The Brooklyn Paper story quotes Bob Collyer, Deputy Commissioner of Bridges for the City, as saying there is no plan to completely close the BQE or Furman Street during the repairs, which would cause diversion of traffic to local streets. Instead, he said, three lanes of the highway would be kept open at all times.
The repairs are scheduled to start in 2024 and end in 2029, unless Albany, the millstone around New York City’s neck, approves the use of the same contractor for design and construction, in which case it could start in 2021 and be done by 2026.
