Bay Ridge

OPINION: It’s time for a foot/bike path on Verrazano Bridge

October 15, 2014 By Roy Fischman For Brooklyn Daily Eagle
A rally for those in favor of putting a foot/bike path on the Verrazano Bridge will be held on Oct. 18 in Staten Island.
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A dedication was held on Nov. 21, 1964, to open the Verrazano Bridge to the public. 

That day, a group of people spoke out that the bridge should have a walkway. One carried a sign that read, “Are Feet Obsolete?”

Robert Moses, then the head of the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority, didn’t want a pedestrian/ bicycle path.

Now, at the 50th year anniversary, is a good time to fix this mistake. 

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Some feel that a Verrazano foot/bike path would be too long, because the length would be 2.59 miles. 

However, there are paths longer than this that are being built.

San Francisco’s Bay Bridge foot path is two thirds completed. When done, that path will be 4.46 miles long.

The Tappan Zee Bridge is being replaced. The new bridge will include a foot path that will be 3 miles long.

The cost of this foot/bike path? 

When a Department of City Planning study was done in 1997, the price to put a path between the cables of the bridge was estimated to be 26.5 million. That would be 39.2 million in today’s dollars.

Is that too much for a path that will be there for generations when the net profit from the Verrazano tolls is estimated to be 250 million per year?

Let the MTA use more of our Verrazano toll money on enhancements to the bridge instead of subsidizing their other projects.

It is time to put a path on the Verrazano Bridge.  We have waited long enough.

Come out to the rally for the path on Oct. 18 from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. at the Alice Austen House, 2 Hylan Boulevard at Edgewater St., Staten Island.

 

—Roy Fischman

Staten Island


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