‘Crashland’ No More: Mamdani Admin. To Complete Ashland Place Bike Lane Scuttled by Adams
The Department of Transportation is finally fulfilling Mayor Mamdani’s February pledge to implement the last block of the Ashland Place protected bike lane that was scrapped by his predecessor at the behest of a politically connected developer, officials said.
DOT on Wednesday will begin reconfiguring the notorious “Crashland” block of Ashland Place between Lafayette Avenue and Hanson Place — three years after real-estate developer Two Trees successfully enlisted former Mayor Eric Adams’s now-indicted adviser Ingrid Lewis-Martin to convince the then-mayor to remove the block from the initial redesign.
The redesign will convert the block from two-way to one-way traffic for drivers and add a bi-directional protected bike lane on the eastern curb, closing an infamous gap in the bike lane network that advocates dubbed “Crashland” because of the way it forced southbound cyclists into a confusing and dangerous cross-traffic maneuver at Lafayette Avenue.
“We’re proud to start work on the last block of the Ashland Place redesign [to] finally create a continuous protected cycling path from Sunset Park to DUMBO and bring major pedestrian space upgrades to a busy area outside Atlantic Terminal,” DOT Commissioner Mike Flynn said in a statement that also promised a “next generation of street safety projects in the years to come.”
The agency will work on the busy block right outside Atlantic Terminal over the coming weeks, with more street safety upgrades coming down the pike: As part of the DOT project, the agency will also redesign Hanson Place between Ashland Place and St. Felix Street into a “shared street,” and add a two-way protected bike lane on sidewalk of Lafayette Avenue linking Ashland Place to Schermerhorn Street.
DOT initially installed the bike lane on Ashland Place and connecting Navy Street, between Sands Street and Lafayette Avenue, in 2023, with the goal of connecting the Fourth Avenue bike lane all the way to the Manhattan Bridge. But Adams and Lewis-Martin pulled the plug on the last block after pushback from the Brooklyn Academy of Music and Two Trees.
As a result, DOT painted confusing markings that direct cyclists to cross oncoming car traffic to continue down the last block of Ashland, where they had to continue competing with two-way car and truck traffic.
This design is “not intuitive,” the agency admitted in its June presentation to a local community board. City stats show it’s also not safe: There have been 27 reported crashes on the corner of Ashland and Hanson between September 2023 and the end of 2025 — injuring nine people, including five people on bikes. The unprotected block also has the highest rate of crashes of the entire corridor.
Meanwhile, the redesigned sections logged 1,200 cyclists per day in 2025, and the Citi Bike station at the corner of Ashland and Hanson outside Atlantic Terminal is one of the most heavily used in the city, with 43,000 daily trips starting there.
A longtime local advocate praised Mamdani for finally taking the “crash” out of Crashland.
“After years of community support and completely unnecessary political delay by the previous administration, work is finally beginning to finish the job,” said Kathy Park Price, a former activist with Transportation Alternatives, who now directs advocacy and policy at New Yorkers for Parks. “When this work is complete, we can finally retire the name ‘Crashland.’ The curse of Crashland will be over.”
Ashland Place is one of several projects that outside interests scuttled by getting the ear of Adams and close confidantes, including McGuinness Boulevard in Greenpoint, which Lewis-Martin allegedly accepted bribes to alter. Two Trees has denied any wrongdoing in the alleged Lewis-Martin corruption scandal.
Mayor Mamdani came into office vowing to finish stalled Adams-era projects, which also included protected bike lanes Bedford Avenue and Third Avenue in Brooklyn, as well as busways on Fordham Road and Tremont Avenue in the Bronx.
Mamdani has ordered DOT to finish McGuinness, Tremont Avenue, and Fordham — but Hizzoner has yet to budge on Bedford and Third avenues.
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