Unauthorized ‘Detour’ Sign Erected by Kent Ave. Residents
By Phoebe Neidl
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
WILLIAMSBURG—The controversy over the Kent Avenue bike lane escalated over the weekend when local residents erected an unauthorized “Detour” sign on the largely industrial Williamsburg street. The orange and black sign instructs drivers to use Wythe Avenue, which runs parallel to Kent, as an alternate route “due to the bike lane and parking problem created by NYC Department of Transportation.”
A new two-way bike lane was installed on Kent Avenue this past fall, accompanied by “No Stopping” signs, which have caused an uproar among community residents and businesses who lost a number of free curbside parking spaces and say the safety of their children is now at risk.
“You cannot even drop off your kids. Buses are getting tickets. The deliveryman doesn’t want to deliver, even my grocery delivery guy doesn’t want to come, ” says Kent Avenue resident Leo Moskowitz.
“It’s like living on a highway. It’s less safe. Trucks are zooming like crazy. Kids can’t play outside. People are very upset and talking about moving away,” he says.
Several published reports have suggested the Kent Avenue dispute is rooted in a cultural clash between the Hasidic community that is dominant in the neighborhood and the “hipsters” that dominate the bike lane, but Moskowitz says “this is not a Hasidic fight, it’s a community fight.”
In a letter to the Brooklyn Eagle last week, a Kent Avenue resident of 18 years, Miranda Banks, wrote “I also bike to work every day. Bike lanes are great. However, the placing of lanes on Kent Avenue and removal of parking have done a disservice to the community.”
Banks says, “The traffic moves faster and no parking makes living here more difficult.”
Borough President Marty Markowitz, City Council Members David Yassky and Diane Reyna and state Senator-elect Daniel Squadron have also voiced their concerns about the new traffic arrangement on Kent Avenue in a letter to Brooklyn Transportation Commissioner Joseph Palmieri.
The new Detour sign, a “notice to all drivers from the residents of Kent Ave.” warns vehicles that “buses will be at an angle blocking the road and the bike lane for safety during the hours of 8-10 a.m. and from 4-6:30 p.m.”
Local activist Isaac Abraham, who is running for David Yassky’s City Council seat, says that the sign is just taking a “verbal statement” from DOT official Josh Benson and turning it into an actual advisory.
Both Abraham and Moskowitz claim that at a community meeting a few months ago, when residents were asking how they should drop their children off at the school on Kent Avenue since there is ‘no stopping,’ Benson suggested they drop them off in the middle of the street and just hold up traffic.
The sign is not only for truckers, but is meant to get DOT’s attention as well, says Moskowitz. “We are taking Josh Benson for a ride,” he says.
The DOT did not respond by press time.
There is only one school directly on Kent Avenue, according to Moskowitz, and the DOT recently changed the signs there to read “No Stopping Except for Buses,” which did not placate Moskowitz, who then asked “What if they miss the bus? What if you drop your kid off at school?”
“We’re just asking the DOT to give us back the parking,” says Moskowitz, who said he believes that both biking and parking can be accommodated. “I ride a bike too…I’m not against bikers. Bikers are a good thing, but we can accommodate cars,” he says.
But Moskowitz did complain that bikers don’t follow traffic rules. “Bicyclists pass the red flashing light. They don’t care,” he said in reference to the light used on school buses.
“Bikers don’t obey a single rule,” concurred Abraham. “They totally ignore the flashing light… Kids’ safety is in jeopardy. This is all created by the DOT. That is a fact.”
“Safety is paramount,” says Wiley Norvel, spokesman for the bicycling advocacy group Transportation Alternatives. Though Norvel says safety lies in having the two-way bike lane.
Both Moskowitz and Abraham suggest that a bike lane be kept only on one side of Kent Avenue, the side that abuts the Navy Yard, so that the “residential side” can be freed up for cars again.
“Pulling out one side of the bike lane is effectively removing the bike lane,” says Norvel. “That’s not a compromise. It would threaten the safety and utility of the bike lane. It’s a two-way street, so the same safety issues are in effect on both sides,” he said, adding that a two-way lane on one side of the street, as is proposed in the Brooklyn Greenway project, is unrealistic in the near term. “It’s not really possible right now. I wish it were the case. It’s a major capital project, nobody thinks that we can whip that out in the next few months.”
In the initial plan for Kent Avenue, available on the DOT’s web site, parking restrictions were to be lifted on side streets off of Kent Avenue to help make up for the spaces lost, but that measure has yet to be taken.
Scott Gastel of the DOT has said that the potential parking changes on these side streets, running from Clymer to North 14th streets, are still “under review.” He could give no timeframe for how long the review process would take, but said that they are “continuing to discuss the changes with the community.”
As for the Detour sign, Moskowitz says the city has no right to remove it because it’s posted on private property, even though it regards behavior in a public space. “It’s an advisory just as any other company can advise,” said Abraham. “Like McDonalds or Burger King puts up a sign. It’s on private property.”
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