Ocean Parkway Safety Petition Delivered To Governor, State DOT Says It's Working On It
Yesterday, Councilmember Brad Lander, Kensington residents, and transportation safety advocates delivered the ‘Our neighborhood is not a highway’ petition, which calls on the New York State Department of Transportation to sign off on a safety plan to address the dangerous Church Avenue and Ocean Parkway intersection, directly to Governor Cuomo’s Manhattan office.
Last year, neighbors chose this intersection as a winning project in participatory budgeting, which allocated $200,000 to safety upgrades at the notorious intersection – but that money has gone unspent because the New York State Department of Transportation has not approved a plan from the New York City DOT that would make it safer to cross.
Following the death of 73-year-old neighbor Patricia Ngozi Agbim as she crossed the intersection in June, a renewed push has been made to find out what the problem is at the NYS DOT. Her husband Silas, who spoke publicly for the first time in a CBS report this week, said, “I can’t get my wife back, but I don’t want anybody to lose a mother, father, wife, children — anybody. Enough is enough. It’s time that we move to do something.”
Elected officials say they received a hopeful letter from the NYS DOT last week, stating that the agency is reevaluating the intersection and considering improvements that could be made, including the safety plan that community members voted to fund.
“We are encouraged that NYS DOT is finally recognizing the need for safety improvements at this dangerous intersection,” said Lander. “But the time for study has passed. NYC DOT has a plan on the table, my constituents voted for it, we put the funding in the budget last year. NYS DOT has had the proposal for more than 9 months. It is time for them to act.”
There were 36 pedestrian and cyclist injuries and four fatalities there between 1995 and 2008, according to Transportation Alternatives’ CrashStat. Six pedestrians were killed on Ocean Parkway between 2009 and 2011 — more than on any other road in Brooklyn — according to Tri-State Transportation Campaign’s Most Dangerous Roads for Walking report.
Photo via Brad Lander’s office
