DOT Changes Parking Regulations
Several changes designed to bring traffic relief to major roadways in Ozone Park have been made by the city’s Department of Transportation (DOT), State Sen. Joseph Addabbo announced.
Addabbo followed up with the DOT to provide parking relief for customers of Ozone Park businesses along a busy traffic corridor after the agency’s 2010-2011 study of the area surrounding the dangerous intersection of Cross Bay Boulevard, Rockaway Boulevard and Liberty Avenue resulted in the installation of traffic barriers on Liberty Avenue and changes to bus and parking lanes, traffic pedestrian safety islands and turning lanes.
During a 2010 tour the area with Community Board 10’s Betty Braton and then-Assemblywoman Audrey Pheffer, Addabbo noted, “Long after the DOT study is completed and implemented, the people and businesses in this area will have to live with the changes.” He added that the community should have input to all proposed changes put on the table by DOT. Pheffer said at the time that “the parking changes, like daylighting intersections, will affect businesses by taking away customers’ parking.”
Back then, several small business owners along Rockaway Boulevard and Liberty Avenue said something needed to be done, but were reserving their judgment of the plan’s effectiveness until they witnessed the actual changes. Modell’s, Midway Cabinets, Venice Carpets, Bob’s Sneaker Corner and their customers had many concerns when the parking and traffic pattern changes along Liberty Avenue and Rockaway Boulevard took place.
Addabbo believed that altering the parking situation in the affected area to maximize legal parking certainly improves the potential for increased business for the local stores during this tough economy.
In response to the complaints from businesses and constituents, in November 2011, Addabbo wrote to DOT’s Borough Planner Felix Okolo to look into the feasibility of changing the parking regulations on the north side of Rockaway Boulevard between Cross Bay Boulevard and Liberty Avenue.
The senator’s Howard Beach district office received a Dec. 22, 2011 reply from Queens Borough Commissioner Maura McCarthy. She wrote that her “borough engineering staff performed an investigation at that location and discovered that due to the new roadway markings along Rockaway Boulevard, the area has been marked as a parking lane and is no longer designated as a curbside travel lane.”
The DOT then prepared an order to remove the “no standing” regulation during the afternoon rush hour between 4 and 7 p.m., and extend the hours of metered parking from the posted 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. limit on existing signs.
The senator was pleased to see DOT respond to an issue that his office had forwarded following a concern expressed by both local businesses and customers.
Addabbo is now working with Board 10 and DOT to re-examine the area for the Liberty Avenue merchants who have been affected by customers not being able to conveniently park and use those stores after the DOT-erected concrete barriers prevented the traffic flow from Cross Bay Boulevard.
