Community Board 1 voted Tuesday to support Community Board 3 in the board’s efforts to reopen Park Row to traffic. The strongly worded resolution came in the wake of the Police Department’s recently released Draft Environment Impact Statement.
The D.E.I.S. found that the closure of the area near One Police Plaza has had a negative effect on neighborhood traffic patterns, but it denied the claim that Chinatown businesses have suffered as a result. Because of security concerns, the Police Department wants Park Row to remain closed to traffic indefinitely.
C.B. 1’s Seaport Committee and full board slammed the D.E.I.S. as biased, overly complicated and incomplete. In particular, committee members noted that the report did not address the effects of the Park Row closure on the streets south of the Brooklyn Bridge.
Several studies, including the D.E.I.S., have found rampant government parking permit abuse in the Downtown area, leading community members to doubt the Police Department’s motives for keeping Park Row closed.
“Things they’re doing in the name of security, they are really doing in the name of parking,” said Seaport Committee chairperson John Fratta.
– Skye H. McFarlane
Bologna vs. Bari
