The Brooklyn-Queens Expressway was begun by the Regional Plan Association in the 1930s, and completed by Robert Moses in 1964. The mixed legacy of the BQE is well understood by New Yorkers who live, work and commute through its bifurcated neighborhoods daily. In Wallabout, Fort Greene and Clinton Hill, the BQE cuts an elevated swathe along Park Avenue from Navy to Steuben Streets. The sense of a v
isual and physical barrier of the BQE overpass is emphasized by neglected traffic circumstances on Park Avenue that unwittingly promote a speed corridor bypass, severing the neighborhood and challenging pedestrians, mass-transit customers, cyclists and motorists alike. At the same time, the BQE provides covered parking as a year-round, all-weather amenity to the neighborhood. In April 2010, Architecture for Humanity began working with Myrtle Avenue Revitalization Project (MARP). MARP led with substantial work in their project “Under the BQE” to study the space, initially for potential parking revenue and programming. MARP also hosted visioning workshops, facilitated by partners SpaceBuster/raumlaborberlin (2009) and Pratt Institute Graduate Center for Planning (2010), to help the community conceptualize opportunities for the area under the BQE. AFHny was invited to build upon the visioning workshops and help reconsider the BQE as a broader community asset in addition to covered parking. AFHny volunteers researched the neighborhood, conducted surveys and counts, collected case studies, and began a dialogue with like-minded organizations and experts. This process generated a volume of research and substantial expertise among the volunteers. In August of 2011, AFHny began the development of “Wallabout Mile,” a safety plan for Park Avenue and the entire Wallabout neighborhood (a 32-block site), keeping in mind that interventions can be made in ways that achieve benefits across multiple needs (safety, social, economic, environmental). AFHny survey information combined with community input, especially from the AFHny-facilitated community workshop held November 3, 2011, shed light on the critical, decades-old unaddressed traffic and safety issues in the neighborhood. AFHny believes that these improvements are crucial to restoring the north-south crossgrain of the district, strengthening communities along Park Avenue, and to making the BQE a true community asset.
