Chaotic Rockaways Intersection to Get Bike and Pedestrian Upgrades in 2027

The messy seven-way intersection of Beach 35th Street, Seagirt Boulevard and Rockaway Freeway and Beach Channel Drive in the Rockaways will undergo a major $25 million revamp including protected bike lanes and improved pedestrian infrastructure, city officials said.

Queens Borough President Donovan Richards this week pledged to kick in $500,000 for the project, which won’t start until 2027 as part of sewer upgrades in the flood-prone coastal neighborhood of Edgemere.

Since 2019, there have been 112 reported crashes injuring 54 people in the small project area — nearly two wrecks a month — including 49 injured in cars and five pedestrians, according to Crash Mapper.

“Thankfully, no one died in those crashes. But we’re not waiting until someone loses their life to take action,” Richards wrote on Twitter Monday.

The convoluted junction sits next to elevated A train tracks and a senior housing complex that opened six years ago. A gnarly web of roadways overwhelmingly caters to private automobiles, despite “relatively low volumes” of drivers, according to a Department of Transportation presentation [PDF] from last year.

Pedestrians can’t legally traverse the intersection east to west without making a circuitous trip via several pedestrian islands. Proposed upgrades include larger pedestrian islands, raised crosswalks and dead-ending Beach 35th Street to create cul-de-sac at the crossing’s northwest corner.

A new raised bike lane on built-out curbs will go on each side of Beach Channel Drive for two blocks west of the intersection, along with a raised crosswalk and sewer upgrades.

It’s unclear if any of the raised bike lanes will be “mountable,” a design the city installed on nearby Beach 20th Street in recent years that encourages motorists to drive up on the paths and block them.

The presentation notes those kinds of elevated paths are “required… for emergency access,” but also shows non-mountable curbs with plantings separating the lanes from traffic as an option.

DOT in 2022 added protected bike lanes and pedestrian space to narrow a mile Seagirt Boulevard from the nasty intersection east to Beach Ninth Street.

The city will design the Beach 35th Street cul-de-sac to be mountable for emergency services, officials said.

North of the hectic intersection, the city will build out a painted pedestrian space and raised bike lanes along Beach Channel Drive and expanded sidewalks on Far Rockaway Boulevard.

DOT and the Department of Design and Construction are working on the upcoming capital project, which also includes sewer upgrades in the area that suffers from regular flooding due to it being near Jamaica Bay.

The upcoming overhaul will cost $24.8 million, including a $2.6 million federal grant, and the city will put out a final design by next year. Construction will take two years, wrapping up in 2029.

DOT and DDC did not respond for comment by press time.