A chronically deteriorating section of the Hudson River Greenway uptown will reopen next week after months of sinkhole repairs — but officials admitted that they still need to figure out how to permanently fix the vital transportation infrastructure's underlying problems.
Activists, of course, are pushing the simplest solution: Removing the westernmost lane of the adjacent northbound Henry Hudson Parkway — which has not deteriorated — and converting it into a bike lane.
For now, however, the bike and pedestrian path between W. 181st and Dyckman streets will reopen on Dec. 20, according to the Parks Department, but "substructure issues" remain, so officials are looking for a solution with other agencies and the state, which controls the highway.
"While durable repairs have been made, efforts are ongoing to address underlying challenges and create a stronger, safer greenway for New Yorkers," Manhattan Borough Commissioner Tricia Shimamura in a statement.
The bike and pedestrian paths north of the George Washington Bridge have caved in at least twice in as many years, most recently after some heavy rain fall this summer. Rather than spending big bucks on major fixes or re-patching the same spot over and over, the city should just repurpose one of the three adjacent highway lanes for cyclists, local advocates and traffic experts said.
"If the highway lane had bikes and light weight vehicles on it, it could last for a very long time, because it’s designed to carry heavy trucks," said Allegra LeGrande, an Inwood cyclist who regularly commutes downtown on the greenway. "The highway is in better shape because it is built to carry much heavier stuff."
Carving out road space for bikes now makes even more sense as a long-term solution, said the city's former Traffic Commissioner Sam Schwartz, given that traffic on the three northbound lane thins out in that area.
"It could be an excellent solution," Schwartz, aka "Gridlock Sam," told Streetsblog. "The highway isn’t collapsing and it has far more capacity than it needs once you get [north of] the George Washington Bridge."
Narrowing the road would also prompt drivers to slow down, the traffic guru said.
"By necking it down to two lanes and adding a bicycle lane, it would make it safer to travel," he said.
A lane on the highway would also mean fewer hills for cyclists to climb going to and from the Henry Hudson Bridge to the Bronx, where the Metropolitan Transportation Authority plans to open a bike path next year.
"That lane would be more of a stable grade for people commuting from The Bronx," LeGrande said.
Locals have in the past put forward a plan to do just that, to provide a safe detour during past closures but the city wouldn't bite claiming in 2022 it would cost $2 million and require a lengthy study by the state Department of Transportation. Instead Parks sent cyclists on a dangerous two-mile detour through streets without protection from car traffic.
The agency's capital repairs ended up costing more than $1.2 million during the first go-around two years ago, and Parks's press office did not have an estimate for the second round of fixes yet.
The agency pulled a similar maneuver when it suddenly closed off the Cherry Walk section of the waterfront greenway for repairs for six months, between 100th and 125th streets, rerouting cyclists onto unprotected roadways nearby. That stretch is set to reopen in March, according to Parks.
One uptowner last week got into a crash with a car driver, causing him to chip his front tooth, on that section's detour along Riverside Drive, and said the city should provide a proper safe route.
"It’s like a crazy thing not to do," said Ira Gershenhorn.
Gershenhorn, ironically, was on his way home from a community board meeting to advocate for a proposal the civic panel was discussing to convert one of two lanes of the northbound off-ramp from the Henry Hudson Parkway to 125th Street.
"This is low-hanging fruit," Gershenhorn said.
Instead of the city's half-measures, officials must take seriously these crucial pieces of greenway as transportation infrastructure, like it does when roads close down for work, Schwartz said.
"If a traffic roadway is closed, an alternate is found that is usually at least safe or some capacity is added," the transportation veteran noted. "That should be routine with protected bike lanes as well."
