Tonight: CB 10 Committee Set to Vote on Morningside Ave Improvements

Image: NYC DOT

Manhattan Community Board 10 has scheduled a committee vote for this evening on proposed pedestrian improvements to Morningside Avenue in Harlem.

The item appeared on a parks and transportation committee agenda sent out this afternoon. The meeting is set for 6:30 p.m.

DOT has proposed restriping Morningside between 116th Street and 126th Street from two lanes in each direction to one lane in each direction with a center striped median, concrete pedestrian islands and left turn lanes [PDF]. Parking lanes on each side would be widened, allowing space for cyclists and double-parked drivers. At entrances to Morningside Park, on the west side of the avenue, DOT has proposed painted curb extensions in the parking lane. The proposal does not include bike lanes.

The proposal was developed in response to a request from the North Star Neighborhood Association. While there is general agreement that speeding drivers are a major problem on Morningside, Community Board 10 has yet to endorse the city’s plan to make the street safer. Community Board 9 voted in favor of the road diet last month.

DOT is scheduled to make another presentation tonight. A call to the CB 10 office confirmed that the committee is expected to vote on a resolution.

CB 10 has a history of inaction and opposition when it comes to livable streets projects. A solid showing could make all the difference for a safer Morningside Avenue.

Tonight’s meeting starts at 6:30 at 215 W. 125th Street, third floor conference room.

  • cc

    What the hell kind of car needs a 14 foot wide parking space? Are they assuming everyone is driving a Hummer. Make the parking lane narrower and put in bike lanes. Or widen the sidewalks. A parking lane need not be over 9 feet wide. 10 feet tops.

  • Ben Kintisch

    This is how DOT gets bike infrastructure in without putting in bike infrastructure. Rather than battle it out with each Community Board, they focus on “traffic calming” and provide extra wide parking lanes, knowing that they will be used by cyclists.

    It’s not ideal but a useful step forward. We have this in Brooklyn on Classon Ave. and Prospect Park South, both of which have improved markedly for cyclists since the traffic calming redesigns went in.

    Then, we hope, in a few years, as cycling volume increases, to re-visit the street and ask for real bike lanes – or better yet, a curb-side two way protected lane against the park curb, a la PPW.

  • qrt145

    Parking lanes like this one are extra-wide to accommodate illegal double-parking. But, like Ben wrote, they are also useful as unmarked bike lanes.

  • Daphna

    There was not a quorum so they did not vote at the Parks and Transportation Committee of CB10. But they are against this traffic calming. They do not want the primary feature of it which is a lane reduction that fixes the area of excess capacity that leads to speeding. CB10 will take this up at their Executive Committee meeting which is just the Board officers and the chair of each committee. They plan to have a resolution that supports tiny aspects of the plan but that rejects the central feature which is the lane reduction. Also, Carolyn, the chair of the Uniform Services and Transportation Committee of CB9 wants to re-write the motion that CB9 passed at the full Board level. That motion supports the full plan but she wants it to be changed to support only tiny aspects of the plan and reject the lane reduction. A motion that was voted on can not be changed after the fact. But Carolyn might do it since CB9 and CB10 seem to have so little regard for proper procedure.

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