Exactly! Instead of building tunnels, we should put our engineers to work planning to put Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn, etc, up on stilts.
Posted on 02/25/2019 11:17:58 AM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
A proposal to build a Cross Downtown Brooklyn Tunnel, an idea studied by the state in 2010, is sparking new interest.
As the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway from Atlantic Avenue to Sands Street faces a massive, $3.4 billion reconstruction, a once-in-a-lifetime window of opportunity has opened, says longtime Cobble Hill community leader and graphic designer Roy Sloane. Sloane came up with the tunnel concept at a planning session in June 2010.
Sloane, former president of the Cobble Hill Association, is the first to admit he is not an engineer. He was, however, a member of the original Brooklyn-Queens Expressway Advisory Committee and the longest-serving citizen member of the Community Board 6 transportation committee.
A roughly 3-mile-long tunnel, running from the Gowanus Expressway vicinity near the intersection of Fourth Avenue and the Prospect Expressway in the south to Flushing Avenue at the north end, would cut travel time from Gowanus to the Brooklyn Navy Yard by 10 to 30 minutes per trip, Sloane says. It would handle truck traffic bypassing local streets, and much of the cost of constructing and maintaining the tunnel would be borne by roadway users. The tunnel would be tolled, and construction could be financed with bonds.
Would eliminate need for Promenade highway
A Cross Downtown Brooklyn Tunnel could eliminate the need to build a temporary six-lane highway atop the Brooklyn Heights Promenade while the triple-cantilever beneath is rebuilt, supporters say. The “innovative” temporary roadway plan proposed by the city’s Department of Transportation, has shocked local residents and businesses, as it would bring the noise and pollution of 153,000 cars and trucks up to the level of neighborhood yards and streets for years.
With a tunnel bypass, the existing BQE section, which includes the triple cantilever in the Heights, would remain in place as a local feeder road.
(Excerpt) Read more at brooklyneagle.com ...
PING.
They should get AOC championing this project. I hear she’s real good selling big projects to the populace.
Would have to see a graphic of this.
I’m not concerned... With the imminent catastrophic rise in the Atlantic due to globull warming, most of Brooklyn and Queens will end up under water in five years or so... AOC told us so...
Interesting what the Vegas odd on this ever being completed will be! Highly unlikely! Think Big Dig!
>>I’m not concerned... With the imminent catastrophic rise in the Atlantic due to globull warming, most of Brooklyn and Queens will end up under water in five years or so... AOC told us so...<<
The BQS — Brooklyn to Queens Submarine.
If memory serves, they’ve been tunneling under NYC for the better part of 100 years. I bet there’s plenty down there that isn’t on the official records. Plenty of surprises would likely be in store.
One problem with a tunnel of that length is, all it takes is a bad accident tie-up to close it.
I am in the business of building tunnels, this is very doable, it is a straight shot, three miles is long enough to make it a machine driven tunnel and the connecting roadway already exist.
They might consider driving two tunnels side by side, one for each direction, for a total of 8 lanes.
Great idea, no street, utility or traffic interferences or relocations.
I have taken that trip THOUSANDS of times in my lifetime and this is actually a good idea.
I said the IDEA was good.
The final devastating cost and end result probably won’t be.
“I am in the business of building tunnels, this is very doable”
But is a point-to-point highway link going to make much of an improvement in that huge checkerboard of streets and avenues?
Would the tunnel have entry/exit points along the way?
Would the vent outlets along the way blow crappie air among all the buildings?
Do I, in North Carolina, have to help pay for it?
I saw a remarkable statistic in a “strange facts and statistics” book some years ago when I was a kid. Apparently the island of Manhattan weighs less today — with all the buildings, bridges, and streets on it — than it did when the first Dutch explorers arrived hundreds of years ago.
To answer your questions:
But is a point-to-point highway link going to make much of an improvement in that huge checkerboard of streets and avenues?
It will be a tunnel BELOW the city streets.
Yes it will, it will eliminate the “thru” traffic from having to compete with the traffic heading to the East River Bridges, it would save 15 to 30 minutes driving time.
Would the tunnel have entry/exit points along the way?
No, it is a connector between the points before and after the loop along the river.
Would the vent outlets along the way blow crappie air among all the buildings?
No, the tunnel ventilation will be at the portals.
Do I, in North Carolina, have to help pay for it?
No, it will be a toll road with the tolls repaying the bonds that financed construction.
Exactly! Instead of building tunnels, we should put our engineers to work planning to put Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn, etc, up on stilts.
“To answer your questions”
I appreciate your answers.
Why couldn’t “thru traffic” be routed completely outside of Manhattan?
I need to look up and see where the tunnel’s ends are.
This is all in Brooklyn, along the East River. The article has a map of the proposed alignment.
Here is a link to the area.
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