By Bill Parry
The city Department of Transportation is making a change. Dalila Hall, the Queens Borough commissioner since April 2013, has been reassigned to another role at the DOT.
Jeff Lynch will take over as acting borough commissioner until a permanent replacement is made. Lynch had served as the DOT’s assistant commissioner for Intergovernmental Affairs and Community Affairs and Community Relations.
DOT Commissioner Polly Trottenberg made the switch after meeting with members of the Queens delegation to the City Council, a DOT spokeswoman said.
City Councilman Paul Vallone (D-Bayside) was at the meeting with Trottenberg.
“We didn’t ask for anyone to get fired or reassigned, we just needed some help,” Vallone said. “It was a uniform frustration among all the Council members in Queens to varying degrees to boroughwide DOT issues. It was an agency problem and Commissioner Trottenberg felt it was the best move.”
Vallone added it was nothing personal. He said Hall was well-liked and appreciated, but Queens faces a multitude of transportation issues and change wasn’t happening fast enough.
Councilman Daniel Dromm (D-Jackson Heights) was surprised by the move.
“I am going to miss Dalila. We worked very closely on so many projects,” he said. “From the Jackson Heights Transportation Study, where we made streets safer by changing the traffic directions to the two slow zones and she helped us get Diversity Plaza. She was a great commissioner and she responded well to the needs of my community.”
Cristina Furlong, co-founder of the safe-streets advocacy group Make Queens Safer, was shocked by the DOT’s move.
“Delila Hall had a tough job considering she started as borough commissioner right before the Vision Zero Initiative kicked in,” she said. “We found her to be resourceful and responsive to our concerns as we try to make Queens safer.”
Meanwhile, Mayor de Blasio announced that 2014 was the safest year for New York City pedestrians since record keeping began in 1910, with overall traffic fatalities down 15 percent from 2013 and pedestrian fatalities down 27 percent. He is banking on further improvements next year.
The city is launching a comprehensive community planning process for two of the borough’s most notoriously dangerous corridors, Queens Boulevard and Linden Boulevard, to develop redesigns that dramatically reduce crashes along their entire length.
“We are putting every tool we have — engineering, enforcement and education — to use in reaching Vision Zero,” de Blasio said. “This is about more than numbers. Vision Zero means parents can more safely cross streets with their children, and seniors can walk their neighborhoods more easily. We’re approaching this second year of work with proof these methods work and expanding them to even more neighborhoods.”
Reach reporter Bill Parry by e-mail at bparry@cnglocal.com or by phone at (718) 260–4538.
