Plans for opening the new 116th Precinct in southeast Queens are one step closer to becoming a reality.
Members of Community Board 13 unanimously approved at their general meeting in Bellerose on Oct. 23 the de-mapping of a city street in Rosedale as part of the project.
The term “de-mapping” refers to an area or street being removed from an official city map. According to Richard Hellenbrecht, who chairs the Land Use Committee, the proposed de-mapped area is located on an “unbuilt street” which would be used to house a parking lot for police vehicles and “police-related” vehicles.
Hellenbrecht was asked if the parking lot would take away from existing street parking spaces, but the chair assured the community that no spaces would be sacrificed during the process.
The precinct itself is slated to go up on North Conduit Avenue next to the 105th Precinct’s satellite building and the Rosedale Long Island Railroad Station. QNS reported that the 116th Precinct, which would serve Rosedale, Springfield Gardens, Brookville and Laurelton, will be the first in southeast Queens in over 40 years.
NYPD opened the 105th Precinct’s satellite location in 2007, but it was only operational from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. each day. In February 2018 the satellite was expanded into a 24-hour operation which added 18 additional officers and two sergeants in order to provide a better police presence in the southeast Queens area.
Datner Architects is the firm responsible for the building’s design which will feature a public plaza “designed to encourage community awareness, interaction, and engagement with the NYPD 116th Precinct team, as well as connect the neighborhood with the LIRR Rosedale station entrance.” According to Datner’s website, the building is slated to be complete in 2021.
When the plan for the precinct was first unveiled in July 2017, Mayor Bill de Blasio and NYPD Commissioner James O’Neill said that the 105th Precinct’s satellite building would house the new 116th Precinct. But in April 2018, the mayor secured $70 million in the executive budget for the construction of a brand-new precinct for the area.
For years, residents in the area were served by the 105th Precinct, which reportedly had an average emergency response time of 9 minutes, two minutes slower than the citywide average of 7 minutes. The precinct is the fifth largest in the city, covering 12.43 square miles and 354 miles of roadway in southeast Queens.
“Our investment in a new 116th Precinct will … help reduce response times, and bring an additional police presence to the fast-growing neighborhoods in southeast Queens,” de Blasio told the Daily News back in April.
