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NYC’s Delancey Street to get ‘road diet’ thanks to $21M from feds
By
Stephen Nessen
Published Feb 1, 2023
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NYC Department of Transportation
By
Stephen Nessen
Published Feb 1, 2023
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A dangerous stretch of Delancey Street in Manhattan will get major safety upgrades thanks to a new federal program helmed by New York City's former transportation commissioner.
The U.S. Department of Transportation on Wednesday announced a grant of nearly $21 million for the city to upgrade the busy street at the foot of the Williamsburg Bridge. It’s a part of the city where cyclists navigate through a bike lane next to several busy lanes of traffic and where there’s little space for pedestrians.
The award is among the first to be distributed through the federal “Safe Streets For All” initiative, which was created by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill and allocates $800 million this year to add safety features to roadways across the country that have high rates of crashes.
The Delancey Street upgrades will come to a notorious area that’s seen more than 200 crashes over the last decade — and where 12-year-old Dashane Santana was struck and killed by a driver in 2012.
The city last made major changes to the area of Delancey Street near the bridge in 2012, but federal officials now aim to give the area a “road diet.” The federal money will pay for a new redesign that reduces traffic lanes on the street, while adding fully protected bike lanes and widened sidewalks.
“Congestion coming on and off the Williamsburg Bridge is a huge environmental concern for this area that is still predominantly low-income people of color,” said City Councilmember Christopher Marte, whose district includes the street. “Accidents are at least a weekly occurrence, and tragedies are too common.”
The federal program is similar to New York City’s Vision Zero program, which launched in 2014 under former Mayor Bill de Blasio and his Transportation Commissioner Polly Trottenberg. The program aims to eliminate traffic deaths across the five boroughs, primarily by redesigning dangerous streets.
Now, Trottenberg serves as U.S. Deputy Secretary of Transportation and oversees the distribution of funding for the federal program.
Trottenberg told Gothamist her work on Vision Zero “definitely informed the design of this grant program and of our larger national roadway safety strategy.”
The $21 million grant is the only one New York City will receive through the program. Meanwhile, Vineland, New Jersey, a town with a population of 60,000, is slated to get $20 million for road improvements.
Trottenberg cautioned against comparing the two.
“This is a program where I think we're trying to seed creative approaches to safety in a bunch of different communities around the country,” she said.
Implementing the changes will fall on the city's Department of Transportation, which fell behind on goals for new bus and bike lanes during Mayor Eric Adams’ first year in office.
However, the agency did make improvements to 1,400 intersections last year. And while traffic deaths fell slightly from 2021 to 2022, last year saw the most children killed since Vision Zero launched.
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transportation
Stephen Nessen
Stephen Nessen covers transportation. Since 2008 he has reported on everything from Occupy Wall Street, the rebuilding of the World Trade Center site, Hurricane Sandy, to Trump’s campaign for president. His transportation reporting has taken him everywhere from the MTA’s secret Rail Control Center to the gleaming subways of Seoul. Got a tip? Email [email protected].
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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