Harlem

A 10-block road diet proposed for Morningside Avenue in Harlem continues to face resistance from Manhattan Community Board 10. In the latest development, it seems the transportation committee chair of CB 10 is trying to convince neighboring Community Board 9, which contains the west side of the avenue, to amend its vote in favor of the road diet and fight against it instead. Meanwhile, Council Member Mark Levine says DOT has heard more than enough input from the community boards and urged the agency to move ahead with the project.

According to Harlem's Community Board 10, there is apparently no such thing as a street redesign worth pursuing. Over the course of two-and-a-half hours Tuesday night, members of the board's transportation committee declined to support a road diet for Morningside Avenue, attacked a community-based street safety plan installed on Mount Morris Park West, and asked DOT to reconsider Select Bus Service on 125th Street again -- this time on the pretense that it would harm the elderly and disabled.

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

Three people were killed by motorists in separate crashes in Manhattan and Brooklyn over the weekend.

A plan to slow drivers and provide safer crossings for pedestrians along Morningside Avenue in Harlem is on the agenda for Manhattan Community Board 9's full board meeting tonight. A positive vote would set the stage for CB 10, which also covers the project area and has a history of stalling livable streets projects, to take action.

A big new pedestrian space next to a busy Harlem park, installed last summer as part of a community board-backed traffic calming plan, is being scaled down by the agency that created it. Why the change? DOT says it’s responding to complaints that the original design created too much space for pedestrians, and not enough for double-parked drivers.

On Wednesday evening, Manhattan Community Boards 9 and 10 jointly hosted a public forum on traffic calming for Morningside Avenue, including a presentation by NYC DOT about its safety proposals. Board members were generally receptive to DOT's plan, which is expected to go back to each board for resolutions of support, while offering their own suggestions -- some reasonable, some not so much. DOT said at the meeting it would like positive votes before moving ahead with the plan.

Community Boards 9 and 10 in Harlem will again hear from DOT tonight on a plan to calm traffic on Morningside Avenue [PDF]. The proposal was developed in response to a request from the North Star Neighborhood Association, and though there is general agreement that speeding drivers are a major problem on Morningside, the community boards have so far failed to endorse the city's plan to make the street safer.

State Senator Bill Perkins let it slip during a hearing yesterday, and today the MTA and DOT made it official [PDF]: Select Bus Service is back on track for M60 buses running along 125th Street, scheduled to launch in April 2014.