New York City Mayor Eric Adams has announced the award of nearly $30 million in federal funding for safety improvements along Queens Boulevard. This grant, part of the “Safe Streets and Roads for All” program, will be funded through the approximately $1 billion in federal infrastructure funding that has been secured under the Adams administration.
The redesign of Queens Boulevard, set to begin in fall 2024 and expected to take three years, is an important part of a broader plan to permanently improve the corridor. The project will expand and reconstruct the service road medians resulting in a continuous raised pedestrian mall and a grade-separated bicycle path. Additional improvements include enhancing accessibility at all bus stops, installing a planted buffer and vertical barrier to protect pedestrians from traffic, and adding new lighting and seating.
Renderings of new median on Queens Boulevard, courtesy of the New York City Department of Transportation
The funding will be used to redesign a portion of Queens Boulevard from Roosevelt Avenue to 73rd Street, historically known as the “Boulevard of Death,” transforming it into a safer thoroughfare. The grant is also planned to fund the expanded analysis of traffic injuries using technology deployed to 1,700 additional city fleet vehicles.
“Every New Yorker—drivers, cyclists, and pedestrians alike—deserves to feel safe on our streets, and this $30 million investment from the Biden-Harris administration will supplement the additional $1 billion in federal funding our administration has already received to keep New Yorkers safe on our roads,” said Mayor Adams. “These funds will bring much-needed safety infrastructure to Queens Boulevard, help us understand how e-bikes have changed our streetscape, and expand efforts to make our city fleet as safe as possible. Public safety is the prerequisite to prosperity, and that is why our administration has fought for real investments in our city’s traffic safety.”
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Never knew queens boulevard was in East Flatbush
Neither did I, although I lived in Fresh Meadows and routinely took the E and F trains when I worked in the City, and my mother took me to the Howard Johnson’s near the Boulevard nightclub in the ’50s on what I thought was called Queens Blvd.
QB in East Flatbush… well I guess there’s a first for everything.
There is a bike path near me that no one uses. Bikers ride on the sidewalk to the dismay of pedestrians. There is also a bus shelter near the end of a route that no one uses and none on the other side where many people board to reach the subway. There seems to be some common sense lacking in these “improvements.”
People are not going to walk along the “malls” with traffic on either side. Either in Queens or East Flatbush!
🤷♂️
The “Boulevard of Death,” is in Forest Hills—nowhere near East Flatbush. The only boulevard in East Flatbush is Linden Boulevard—unless they call that the Boulevard of Death too for reasons other than cycling.
Are they still planning on having the bike lane grade separated? That was already tried elsewhere. Cars love to park on the grade-separated bike path. Even the police do that. Then the bicyclist is really risking death by trying to get out into traffic down the grade separation without falling down and getting run over. Boulevard of Death indeed.
They need to build a curb that cars can’t drive over. The Concourse design really seems to invite abuse.
This is a Brooklyn story because…?