TSTC Shortsightedness on N.Y.'s Tappan Zee

Writes letter to Gov Elect Cuomo asking to scale back the Tappan Zee Bridge Project, including deleting the rail component.

http://blog.tstc.org/2010/12/23/an-open-letter-to-governor-elect-cuomo/
excerpt

On the capital side, the next Governor should also support the LIRR third track project (key for Long Islanders to reap the benefits of East Side Access) and plans for bus rapid transit in the Tappan Zee Bridge/I-287 corridor. Additionally, plans for Tappan Zee Bridge replacement could be scaled down and proceed without the commuter rail connection from Rockland to NYC. Most commuters using the Tappan Zee are travelling to suburban destinations, not ending their trips in Manhattan, so the bus rapid transit connection, which provides much greater utility at the most affordable cost, should be retained.

"Scaling back", without stressing modularity of design -- aka a design allowing components to be added in seperate stages -- for such a major corridor is simply asinine.

The project should include the rail component from Suffern to Tarrytown, with the design permitting a future extension to White Plains and Portchester, and eventually, via the proposed Cross Sound Tunnel, to Long Island and ultimately Jones Beach. Such would be extremely sensible later addition, for serving future desification-redevelopment of the I-287 Cross Westchester Expressway's numerous office parks, which would significently add potential risership.

Likewise, the project should include a barriar seperated 'busway' designed to be expandable to a minimum of two lanes in each direction, given the economics of scale (the 'busway' like any other seperate carriageway requires its own ramps), and serving as a seperate express truckway- more effectively providing additional east-west road capacity where it's scarce, and the ability to better seperate types of traffic.




The twin configuration variant with the best modularity of design
Indeeed, I-287 is Westchester County's sole east-west interstate highway, and one of two of the county's east-west freeways: the other, the Cross County Parkway does not permit trucks -- hence the 'parkway' designation -- and is missing its extensions east of the Hutchinson River Parkway and west of the Saw Mill River Parkway, let alone any bridge or tunnel connections to Long Island or New Jersey. A third planned east-west freeway -- the Bear Mountain Parkway, remains significently unbuilt, despite the proximity of the Indian Point nuclear power station.

Meanwhile, the two closest completed east-west interstate links are I-84 to the north and the heavily used and most difficult to widen I-95 George Washington Bridge/ Trans Manhattan Expressway/ Cross Bronx Expressway.

As the mid-point between I-95 and I-84, I-287 continues to the west of the Hudson River, yet currently has its eastern terminus at I-95 in Portchester/Rye, and currentl lacks a continuation to Long Island- now proposed in the form of the Cross Sound Tunnel. Yet despite the clear need for additional capacity upon the Westchester approach roads, there appears to be a lack of planning for improving the approaches to this new tunnel in Westchester

That the 'mainstream' organizations would rather chip away at a vitally important project for improving regionally scarce east-west high speed road capcity, including adding that which does not yet exist- the rail component, with not a word about designing to add other components later with minimal wasteful demolition (a strange and curious disregard), let alone dare suggest other projects to place less of a reletove burden upon the I-95 Cross Bronx Expressway, speaks volumes about these organization's nature as part of a broader effort to acclimatize people to expect less butter, and more security theater state, cigarette-pharma market protection 'drug war' nonsense.

Mexico To Ignore Madrid For Seoul?

This does have space for a set of cut and cover tunnels

Mexico City has a river lined with roads that activists want to re-work into a more pedestrian friendly corridor.

Yet today's New York Times article fails to mention any consideration of Madrid, Spain's acclaimed project that placed the roads underground, instead maintaining the traffc flow all upon the surface- despite its superiority and that Mexico was established by Spainish people.

Instead, these activists are presenting the model of a project in Seoul, Korea which replaced a 4 lane elevated freeway and 10 lane surface road that had been built over a covered stream, with the stream uncovered and restored, but with no underground roadways to increase accessibility for the largest number of people.

Take Out Manhattan's East River Drive?

http://macaulay.cuny.edu/eportfolios/munshisouth10/group-projects/east-river/future/

excerpt

Currently, the Carl Schurz Park is separated from the bountiful waters of the East River, which it was once connected to in the past. In between the Park and the water lies the Franklin D. Roosevelt East River Drive – commonly known as the FDR Drive. It forms the line of demarcation between the interior of the East Side and the East River, running approximately nine and a half miles long. Two layers of the FDR separate the Carl Schurz Park from the East River: the northbound FDR lanes the on the middle layer, and the southbound FDR lanes on the bottom layer, with the park itself on the top layer. Although the parkway is a necessary facet of the area, and serves a vital purpose for commuters, it also has several harmful polluting effects on the park and its the species. Therefore, our proposed idea is to redirect the Parkway away from the park, so that it can once again be joined with the aquatic environment and species that it has previously been joined with in the past. Reconnecting the park to the waterfront could return it to a more natural state.

Models for Reconnection:

Cheonggye Freeway, South Korea: In the 1970s, the Cheonggye River in Seoul, Korea, was covered and a road and elevated freeway were built over it. By the year 2000, the area became one of the most congested and noisy parts of Seoul. IT was decided that the freeway would have to be removed in order to combat these issues, as well as stimulate the economy. Freeway demolition began in June, 2003 and was completed in September, 2003. Stream restoration began in July, 2003 and was completed in September, 2005. In March, 2003, Seoul began constructing its first Bus Rapid Transit line, which serves the route of the freeway and is designed to accommodate the drivers of the 120,000 cars that used the road every day. It was completed in June, 2003, at the same time the freeway was closed.

The Korea project was about demolishing an elevated 4 lane freeway, and its flanking 5 lane service surface roads, and uncovering the stream that had been previously paved over.

It is IMHO unwise to come to too many conclusions about the Cheonggye Freeway removal's transport utility without finding any before and after maps (only finding before and after pictures about the obvious that the project made the place much prettier and infinitely more pedestrian friendly).

However, the East River Drive, otherwise known as the FDR Drive is Manhattan's sole remaining full north-south freeway, with the parallel West Side Highway no longer filling the colloquially accepted definition of such with the post Westway defeatism consigning that corridor’s vehicular traffic to traffic lights south of 57th Street.

It's a telling indication where this nation is headed when the universities and the foundation type entities are supporting such nonsense to waste countless person-hours while increasing pedestrian-vehicular conflict, rather than the truly progressive type projects as recently completed in Madrid, Spain.

Madrid, Spain Reclaims Riverfront

Madrid Big Dig - Proyecto Madrid Rio
Buries M-30 beneath new parks along Madrid's Manzanares River

An interesting project I have NOT seen on any of the mainstream blogs such as Streetsblog nor the Infrastructuralist in conformity to the elitist doctrinaire bias for removing freeways -

Indeed, explore Madrid to see how the cookie-cutter 'environmentalist' and 'new urbanist' entities continually *pretend* that freeways and grade separation don't fit within urban environments.





Elements

1. Construction of a new 4 kilometer tunnel along the river banks
2. Construction of a new 3.8 kilometer tunnel in the northern intersection
3. Renovation of all intersections with national highways
4. Creation of 6 new exits and access routes along the ring
5. Construction of a 6 kilometer by-pass tunnel connecting the east and west sides of the city

The M 30 had been build decades earlier.

This project was not simply covering the existing M 30, but rather digging it down, and not only for the M 30 but for connecting routes, such as that from the southwest.

It was reported at
http://www.landezine.com/index.php/2011/04/madrid-rio-by-west8-urban-design-landscape-architecture/

The ambitious plan by Madrid’s mayor Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón to submerge a section of the M30 ring motorway immediately adjacent to the old city centre within a tunnel was realised within a single term of office. The city undertook infrastructure measures over a total length of 43 kilometres, six of them along the banks of the River Manzanares, at a total cost of six billion Euro. West 8 together with a group of renowned architects from Madrid, united under the name MRIO arquitectos led by Ginés Garrido Colomero designed the master plan for Madrid RIO.

In 2005, an invited international competition was announced. The proposal submitted by West8 and MRIO for the design of the reclaimed area above the tunnel was the only submission to resolve the urban situation exclusively by means of landscape architecture. The design is founded on the idea »3 + 30« – a concept which proposes dividing the 80 hectare urban development into a trilogy of initial strategic projects that establish a basic structure which then serves as a solid foundation for a number of further projects, initiated in part by the municipality as well as by private investors and residents. A total of 47 subprojects with a combined total budget of 280 million Euros have since been developed, the most important of which include: the Salón de Pinos, Avenida de Portugal, Huerta de la Partida, Jardines de Puente de Segovia, Jardines de Puente de Toledo, Jardines de la Virgen del Puerto and the Parque de la Arganzuela. In addition to the various squares, boulevards and parks, a family of bridges were realised that improve connections between the urban districts along the river. The first subprojects were realised in spring 2007. The realization of the whole project is planned for spring 2011.