New York City is hosting a series of tours across the Cross-Bronx Expressway as part of a grand plan to transform the highway, which critics have long decried as a scar of environmental racism that cuts through predominantly Black and Latino neighborhoods.
The fall weekend “walkshops,” as the city has called them, are part of a $2 million study funded through the federal infrastructure bill passed in 2021 that aims to “reimagine” the decades-old expressway, a brainchild of the controversial city planner Robert Moses.
The Department of City Planning, the local and state departments of transportation, and the city Department of Health and Mental Hygiene are organizing the tours, which take place on Saturdays at 10 a.m. and last an hour-and-a-half. More details are available on the Department of City Planning’s website, including a link for the required RSVP.
“For too long, the Cross Bronx Expressway has been a destructive divider of communities,” said Dan Garodnick, the chair of the City Planning Commission, in a statement. “These walkshops will give New Yorkers an opportunity to witness and speak to the on-the-ground conditions and harmful impacts the Cross Bronx Expressway has on those who live and work nearby.”
The Cross Bronx Expressway’s construction displaced some 40,000 residents, mainly in the 1950s and ‘60s. Diesel trucks on the highly trafficked roadway have since been linked to higher air pollution in neighboring communities and some of the highest rates of asthma in the country.
The tours follow a handful of virtual and in-person workshops across the Bronx that sought input on plans to be included in the study — and promise a more up-close and personal experience.
The first kicks off on Saturday at the Bridge Playground in the West Bronx. The second, on Sept. 23, covers the central Bronx neighborhoods of Crotona and Claremont. The third, on Oct. 7, traverses the East Bronx neighborhoods of Parkchester and Unionport.
The final gathering on Oct. 14 will include three simultaneous events — a bicycle tour, a Spanish-language tour and a workshop for those with limited mobility — that will convene and end in a local playground in the heart of the borough.
The two-year study, “Reimagining the Cross-Bronx Expressway,” will identify ways to reduce vehicle emissions in nearby communities and improve road safety on local streets. The city and state are slated to present a multiyear plan with proposals to improve neighborhood conditions around the highway by 2024.
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