Brooklyn–Queens Connector

Depiction of the Brooklyn–Queens Connector

The Brooklyn–Queens Connector, abbreviated the BQX, is a proposed streetcar line in New York City, planned to operate on a north-south line along the East River between the boroughs of Queens and Brooklyn.

Predecessor: Red Hook light rail

File:FairwayRHCableCarByLuigiNovi2.jpg

View of a Brooklyn Historic Railway Association streetcar that was to be placed on a proposed, but never used, streetcar line

In 2011, the New York City Department of Transportation released a feasibility study of a streetcar in Red Hook (to be operated by the Brooklyn Historic Railway Association). The study found that the streetcar wasn't feasible, as it would suffer from high costs, low ridership, and physical constraints like narrow streets.

Connector proposal

The current line was initially proposed by a non-profit group, Friends of the Brooklyn Queens Connector, which commissioned a study to examine the corridor along the Brooklyn and Queens waterfront. First publicly reported on in January 2016, the study proposed a 17-mile (27 km) route between the neighborhoods of Astoria in Queens and Sunset Park in Brooklyn, passing through several neighborhoods on the way. According to reports, the study, which is not public, estimated construction costs of $1.7 billion, annual operating costs of $26 million, and 15.8 million annual riders by 2035. The proposal included a branch going through Downtown Brooklyn to Atlantic Avenue – Barclays Center.

The study described a routing that would begin in Queens near the New York City Housing Authority's Astoria Houses. It would run down 21st Street south to Queensboro Plaza, west onto 11th Street to Newtown Creek. The streetcar would cross Newtown Creek into Greenpoint then, using one-way streets close to the waterfront, pass through Williamsburg and the Brooklyn Navy Yard. It would turn onto Park Avenue, run to Navy Street, then through Farragut Houses, Vinegar Hill, and Dumbo. The line would then run south through Red Hook, cross the Gowanus Canal, and continue south on Third Avenue to 58th Street, where it would turn west to serve the Brooklyn Army Terminal and Industry City. From there, the line would turn east, terminating at the 59th Street subway station in Sunset Park.

Schwartz's firm worked on the proposal for over a year and considered five options aside from streetcars. One other option, Select Bus Service, was estimated to cost $1 billion to implement, and wasn't chosen as it wouldn't raise property values the way that a streetcar would. The engineers projected 52,000 to 53,000 riders per day on the streetcar, which would have required a bus every minute. Each street car would be able to carry 150 to 175 passengers. Additionally, buses would also have a harder time navigating the 12 to 15 streets along the route. The engineers' route would have its own dedicated lanes for the whole route. The study recommended that two facilities for maintenance and storage would be built at a cost of $100 million. In addition, the streetcar would need at least 140 employees to operate the streetcars and a host of other workers, including traffic enforcement agents.

Mayoral endorsement

Long Island City, one of the areas that would be served by the new streetcar

On February 3, the office of Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that the city would begin planning work for the streetcar line, with a formal announcement by de Blasio at his State of the City speech the following day. City officials said that several years of additional study and review would precede groundbreaking, planned for 2019, with service beginning around 2024. Since the line would be a street-level project, the streetcar would not need state approval. The city will rely on increased real estate revenues to pay for the project. Mayor de Blasio's office commissioned a study toward researching the projected effects of the streetcar.

Under the slightly revised plan released by the city, the route would travel 16 miles (26 km) with 30 wheelchair-accessible stations, with an increased construction cost of $2.5 billion. There would be sixty vehicles, costing $5 million total, that would travel at 11.3 miles per hour (18.2 km/h), and would be separated from vehicular traffic for 70% of the route. Two bridges over the Newtown Creek and the Gowanus Canal were proposed, in the case that the Pulaski Bridge over the Newtown Creek, and the Hamilton Avenue bridge over the Gowanus Canal, aren't able to accommodate the vehicles; the Newtown Creek bridge will probably be located at Vernon Boulevard, where another bridge previously existed. A trip between Dumbo and Greenpoint would take 27 minutes via the line. The fare for the route would equal the fare of the subway and the buses.

The line is planned to use multi-section vehicles to negotiate sharp curves at Lorraine Street, Cadman Plaza, 21st Street, and Astoria Boulevard. Streetcars, rather than light rail vehicles (LRVs), are proposed to be used, despite the fact that LRVs have more capacity and shorter headways; this is because streetcars were determined to operate better within mixed-use rights-of-way, as opposed to LRVs, which were determined to operate better within dedicated rights-of-way. Electrification is proposed to be from hydrogen fuel cells within the trains themselves, as opposed to from overhead lines or from embedded rails. Since the BQX would operate on both dedicated rights-of-way and on streets, the BQX would use both standard traffic lights and dedicated signals during operation. Annual operating costs are estimated at $26 million.

The new line would provide a new transit route for 45,000 public-housing residents. An additional motivation for the line has been the tremendous growth in Brooklyn and Queens waterfront areas since the early 2000s.

Development

Friends of the Brooklyn Queens Connector appointed its first executive director, Ya-Ting Liu, on May 5, 2016. Liu will oversee route operations and design.

Criticism

The Brooklyn–Queens Connector, while well acclaimed, has received criticism. Several complaints are that while it is planned to connect to 17 subway stations, it would be far from BMT Canarsie Line (L trains) at Bedford Avenue. The line would also not go near the BMT Jamaica Line (J M Z trains) at Marcy Avenue. Much of the areas that the new streetcar would serve are all 0.5 miles (0.80 km) from the IND Crosstown Line (G trains), while areas in Eastern Queens and parts of Brooklyn do not have nearby subway lines. Since the project would be constructed and run by New York City and not the MTA, it is not known how it would integrate to the MTA's fare system, if at all. Public officials on Staten Island, including Staten Island Borough President James Oddo, did not oppose the plan, but they have stated that they felt under-represented after previous plans in Staten Island, including light rail along the island's North and West Shores, were rejected.

The line was also criticized by public officials in South Brooklyn, who stated that their areas had their express bus service cut, their subway stations lacked elevators, their neighborhoods were under-served by public transit in general, and their requests for express F subway service and more reliable R train service had not yet been heeded. The proposal has also received criticism as it was viewed as a government subsidy to property developers. In addition, the BQX runs through several "100-year flood zones," meaning that the line would be prone to flooding during heavy storms and hurricanes.

Steven Strauss, a Princeton University professor, expressed his reservations about the BQX in a New York Daily News editorial in May 2016. In the article, he stated that he was concerned that by the time the project is completed, it will be potentially obsolete due to the development of autonomous vehicles. Further, he thought the estimated cost of $10 per person per ride might be uneconomic compared to other alternatives. Instead, Strauss recommended that the city engage in a wider Request for Expressions of Interest Process to look at other potential alternatives.