Despite recent attempts by the Department of Environmental Protection to fix a sinking section of a Lindenwood street, the pavement at the corner of 79th Street and 157th Avenue has again sunk by as much as a foot.
The corner is totally unusable to cars, and residents worry about pedestrians walking there and vehicles possibly getting stuck in the dip.
“The hole has gotten worse than ever since they came in to fix it,” said Joe Thompson, a Lindenwood resident and president of the Howard Beach Civilian Observation Patrol. “We visited the hole this week and saw a large puddle completely frozen over. What if someone slips into that because the water can’t drain correctly, or what if a car makes too fast of a turn around the corner not realizing the hole [is there]? It’s dangerous.”
The DEP came in October to work on the street after The Courier first reported on the situation. They did extensive work on the infrastructure of the pipes below ground. This included fixing the connection of the catch basin and sewer at the location. They also inspected the adjacent ground water and sewer infrastructure and found everything to be working normally.
Once the repair was completed, the road was resurfaced from 80th Street down to the sinking area. But, almost three months after the work was completed, some of the resurfacing has begun to sink in, creating potholes on the block, and the corner still remains a problem.
The street has been in a bad condition for years but began to worsen after an April 30 flooding disaster, residents said. The Spring Creek sewer overflow facility, maintained by the DEP, malfunctioned during a major rainstorm that night causing the sewers in Lindenwood to back up, flooding the streets.
A DEP representative said the department has fixed the problem that was causing the street to sink and that they will continue to work with the Department of Transportation to determine what future steps may be necessary to ensure that stormwater can drain off the street properly.
Thompson said the street needs to be elevated to avoid the potential of a tragedy.
“It needs to be fixed again,” he said. “I understand that it is the winter months and it is hard to repave during this time, but at least put cones around the section and make it a caution area until work can be done.”
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