| Releases & Statements
Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum today said that not only is the Jets Stadium drain a waste of money for the cash-strapped City, but it is also a traffic nightmare waiting to happen on the West Side. Standing on the West Side Highway at 12:45 PM, just prior to the start-time of a typical Sunday afternoon football game, Gotbaum pointed to the existing traffic conditions in the area and called on Mayor Bloomberg to drop his stadium plan.
“The West Side is already crowded with cars, and when thousands of Jets fans pour in from every direction, all of Manhattan will be gridlocked,” said Gotbaum. Even the Regional Plan Association says that we can expect “unusually severe traffic congestion” when the football stadium hosts major events.
Gotbaum also presented a series of photographs depicting late-afternoon traffic congestion on the West Side, about the time football games would let out. She explained that the Mayor’s proposed seventy-five-thousand-seat Jets stadium would draw so much additional traffic to the already-congested area on game days that Manhattan would be brought to a standstill.
According to the MTA and the Department of City Planning’s draft environmental impact statement 91% of the off-street parking spaces will be filled in an area that stretches as far south as 21 st street, as far north at 51 st street, and as far east as 6 th Avenue. “This is not just a neighborhood issue,” she continued. “All New Yorkers will pay the price, not only in tax dollars, but also in decreased quality of life. Anyone who wants to get around Manhattan will have to deal with a sea of traffic.”
The Bloomberg Administration claims that nearly 70% of the people attending games at the proposed stadium will travel by public transportation, but Gotbaum noted
that only about 50% of Knicks and Rangers fans travel to Madison Square Garden by mass transit, even though the Garden is located over Penn Station, one of the City’s key transit hubs. Furthermore, basketball and hockey games usually take place not on a Sunday afternoon like football games but on work nights when fans are more likely to use mass transit.
“The Mayor and the Jets are just not leveling with New Yorkers. Their prediction of the highest public transportation usage in American sports history is misguided,” Gotbaum said.
Gotbaum also noted that, despite forecasting record-high public transportation usage, the Bloomberg Administration appears to be hedging its bet by pushing for a higher parking allowance on the West Side than anywhere else in Midtown Manhattan and planning to build a massive parking garage in the area.
“The administration has been reassuring us that the neighborhood will not become a parking lot,” Gotbaum said, “but its policies are paving the way for a traffic nightmare. Mayor Bloomberg needs to take a good look at these pictures and face reality.”
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