Feb. 6, 2011 Staff Report
Local public transportation and planning devoté, admittedly in favor of the renewed push for “congestion pricing,” Angus Grieve-Smith weighs in on his vision for a revamped Queens Boulevard. The hotly contested issue of a toll to use the Queensborough Bridge is back, and Grieve-Smith has joined the discussion, tagging it the local concern for a more attractive and prosperous Queens Boulevard in Sunnyside.
He writes, “…the great boulevards in Paris have many lanes for cars, but they became famous because they were great places to walk. For a century and a half, they have been destinations in themselves, where people from all over the city went to stroll. . . When people stroll, they take the time to window shop, and that often leads to buying. When they see friends, they want to chat, and they often do that over coffee, drinks, or dinner. This is why the boulevards of Paris are lined with shops and sidewalks cafés. Like many of New York’s boulevards, Queens Boulevard was planned in homage to the Champs-Elysées…”
Read Grieve-Smith’s essay in its entirety here on his transportation blog.
Former Councilman Walter McCaffrey is once again taking up his opposition to the toll, as he did in 2007, when he termed it another “tax” on those who can ill afford it. He spoke against it on NY1, “to folks who end up paying another potentially $5,000 a year as this may be similar to London, and they only earn $43,000 a year, and they must bring in their car for business purposes, this is a very, very heavy burden on them.”
