City Council holds city hall meeting to discuss the future of the BQE

The City Council gathered at City Hall Tuesday to discuss the future of the Brooklyn Queens Expressway.
Experts say the vital roadway is quickly deteriorating. Leaders in the community tried to decide on a plan to address the problems at Tuesday’s meeting.
The Department of Transportation proposed to build a temporary road through the Brooklyn Heights Promenade. However, the City Council proposed two other options that they say would be better for their communities and more permanent.
Experts from Arup, an engineering firm privately owned and hired by the Council, explained the two proposals. One was a three-mile tunnel going from the Gowanus Canal to the Brooklyn Navy Yard that would eliminate five miles of the BQE. This plan would cost anywhere from $5 to $11 billion. The second proposal was a capped highway that would cover the cantilever and that would cost over $3 billion.

Both experts and city officials say they want the plans to be environmentally friendly while also meeting the needs of drivers. Chairman of the Committee on Transportation Ydanis Rodriguez also says he wants to make sure the plan that is chosen includes the needs of underserved communities.
Time to decide on a plan is running out after the BQE panel, which was appointed by the mayor, found that the cantilever could become unsafe to drive in only five years.
The DOT in the past has supported other plans that would focus on repairing the existing structure. Meanwhile, the Council said Tuesday that they want to build something that will last into the next century. They say the hope is to have at least one of the solutions approved by June.