Queens college dorm plan draws ire

Kew Gardens Hills residents questioned Queens College officials about their plans to build dormitories for 500 students at a meeting on Thursday, March 8. The residents complained that the new dorms, which will be built with parking spots for about 200 students, would create traffic and parking havoc in an area where vehicular chaos is the norm during the morning and afternoon rushes.
“There is a tremendous traffic impact even without the dorms coming up,” said Jeff Gottlieb, a Queens College graduate, local resident and borough historian. “One dorm, two dorms, three dorms, it’s an open-ended question.”
Several local politicians - Assemblymember Nettie Mayersohn and State Senator Toby Stavisky - joined some 50 residents at the joint meeting of the Flushing on the Hill and Kew Gardens Hills Civic Associations to oppose the plan for a $63 million, on-campus dormitory, scheduled to open for the fall 2009 semester.
“You reach a point where you can’t accept it anymore,” Mayersohn told the crowd.
Other items of concern were whether attracting students from around the country stayed true to the college’s mission and the potential for badly-behaved students, whose schedules are not necessarily compatible with senior citizens and parents of young children living nearby.
“You know they [students] are very different from the adult community … Teenagers are different than 60-year-olds,” said Kevin Forrestal, president of the Hillcrest Estates Civic Association.
In response, Sue Henderson, the Vice President of Queens College, said that the students living in the dorm would mostly be honor students adding that security guards would make sure visitors did not come to the campus to party and that most students wouldn’t bring their cars to campus.
Henderson added that the college was working with the MTA to improve local public transportation, and was considering shuttle buses to transport students to local transportation hubs. In addition, she said the college has contracted a traffic study for surrounding streets.
The college is currently forming an advisory board to get community recommendations. Councilmember James Gennaro advised community members to ask for neighborhood improvements in conjunction with the dorm’s construction. “The purpose of a gathering like this should be to figure what … mitigating concessions can be put on the table,” Gennaro said.