DOT Steps Up Grand Army Makeover
At a meeting Thursday night with three area community boards, the Department of Transportation unveiled its much-anticipated plans for remaking Grand Army Plaza. StreetsBlog summarized the changes in a blog post: Lots of asphalt will be reclaimed for walking and biking. Getting to the central plaza will be a much-improved experience, as will biking to…
At a meeting Thursday night with three area community boards, the Department of Transportation unveiled its much-anticipated plans for remaking Grand Army Plaza. StreetsBlog summarized the changes in a blog post:
Lots of asphalt will be reclaimed for walking and biking. Getting to the central plaza will be a much-improved experience, as will biking to the greenmarket, the Brooklyn Public Library, and the park, thanks to an entirely two-way system of bike lanes. Russo said DOT hopes to begin implementation in August.
The plan got a very positive reaction from other stakeholders, including Robert Witherwax of the Grand Army Plaza Coalition: “We have called for a wholesale rethinking of the interplay between peds, bikes, and cars and the space devoted to each: DOT brought that.” There’s another diagram of the makeover on the jump and lots of graphics in the DOT presentation. You psyched about this? Looks pretty exciting to us.
GAP as a Walkable Destination and Bicycling Hub [StreetBlog]
DOT’s GAP Plan: Bold, Exciting, Crowd-Pleasing [StreetsBlog]
Grand Army Improvements [DOT – pdf]
When i say north I mean the “Top” of the circle… “Behind” the arch. Not Union street or Eastern Parkway. But Vanderbilt and Flatbush at the top.
I do not have trouble getting to the arch by crossing at the traffic light at Union (and Flatbush as it goes into PPW).
That is, it’s the northern corner of that intersection where there is a crosswalk directly to the arch — not the crosswalk that goes more toward the library. (Hope I have my north and south correct as am a little geographically challenged today).
From the other end of the GAP by the fountain, I find the crosswalks challenging.
“I never have any problem biking, driving or walking through the circle, been doing it for 30 years.”
I almost kill myself every time I drive around that thing, probably because I haven’t been doing it for 30 years. It’s insane design, and it only works if you’ve either driven it for 30 years or you’ve spent a couple hours studying a map plus satellite imagery before entering the circle.
For instance, if you’re entering from the Flatbush/Eastern Parkway side near the library and heading towards union, following the signs sends you all the way to the inside loop, and then you have to cut across four or five lanes of traffic to get all the way to the outside of the loop. And the whole route is full of little concrete dividers, half of which aren’t even painted!
I’m thrilled that they’re re-designing it to make it better for everyone. But I think they need to get rid of MORE traffic lanes. They should eliminate that crazy interior loop-de-loop, and just have cars make a freaking left hand turn at that new, giant Flatbush intersection. And there should be a new light where you’d merge into the oncoming traffic from Flatbush.
Fewer lanes there would make driving much, much, much better. And safer for pedestrians and bikes. Win-win.
Benson, I think after the renovations, walking on the INSIDE of GAP becomes much more feasible and appealing for those of us coming from the north: instead of Plaza Street being the ‘path of least resistance’, we can use the crosswalks to get to the fountain/arch islands and use that space to transit the plaza. People take Plaza St because it is easier than cutting through the middle, even when cutting through the middle is shorter.
Hopefully these changes will equalize that somewhat, and bring people into the center more often…
Renato;
I’m not trying to suggest that Italy has the lead over NYC in terms of urban design, or vice-versa. My point was only about the design of piazza’s. I live not too far from GAP. When I walk along plaza street, I see mostly a thickly-wooded parcel across the street, rather than a vista of the whole plaza (as in, once again, Piazza del Duomo). Heck, I can’t even see the arch from many points on Plaza St!
“The Piazza del Duomo in Milano”
It is a beautiful area, and well-maintained, as I recall it (been there once). The church is beyond description.
Yes, Piazza del Duomo is generally car-free… what about the new Times Square and the Lincoln Center?
Will the new WTC be a large car-free plaza?
Renato;
Thanks for the correction. I haven’t been to Rome in some time, so perhaps it’s changed.
The city I mainly travel to (on business) is Milano. The Piazza del Duomo in Milano is still a large car-free piazza for the enjoyment of pedestrians. We don’t have anything like it in NYC.
Yes, it is Piazza del Popolo and is close to Villa Borghese; it is quite similar to Place Vendome in Paris.
Anyway, it seems to me that you overrate Rome and see it with pink glasses: yes, Piazza del Popolo was renovated ten years ago, but right now Rome’s historical plazas are used as parking lots… what a shame! Cars are parked everywhere in Rome… if Bloomberg and newyorkers want to improve New York, they don’t have to see Rome (and italian cities) as a urban model… as a matter of fact, it’s the opposite: as far as urban redevelopment is concerned, NYC offers several ideas to italian cities.