Mayor's BQE Panel Meets With Activists, Promises Public Hearing

BROOKLYN HEIGHTS, BROOKLYN — The panel of experts Mayor Bill de Blasio created to take a fresh look at the city's controversial plans to renovate part of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway will hold its first public hearing in the next few weeks, members said.

The panel's chair Carlo Scissura told activists at a meeting last week that it plans to start a community engagement process soon, according to a blog post from the Brooklyn Heights Association, one of the groups that has led the charge against the city's plan to reconstruct a 1.5-mile stretch of the highway. The BHA was one of 16 community organizations represented at the meeting, held last Thursday.

The 16-person panel, created hours before a packed Town Hall about the plans earlier this month, was put together after months of community pushback to two plans proposed by the Department of Transportation, the most controversial of which would close down the Brooklyn Heights Promenade for at least six years.

Members reiterated at the meeting last week, the first held with activists since the group was created, that they plan to review those DOT options as well as several others that have since been proposed by local activists and architects.

"Chair Carlo Scissura emphasized that 'We’re here to listen. We’re here to learn,'" the BHA wrote. "...According to Mr. Scissura, the Panel’s mandate is 'to consider everything that has been put out,' including the DOT plans; it will closely consider the actual physical condition of the BQE and what can be built there. He made clear that the Panel is 'going to look at everything.'"

Scissura said that the meeting was just the beginning of a lengthy community engagement process that will likely include a public hearing in the next few weeks.

The panel has already started reviewing studies on the BQE, taken a tour of the structure and has plans to meet with the MTA, the Port Authority and the city's Department of Environmental Protection, Scissura told the activists.

Panelists will also form subcommittees focusing on government approval, engineering and constructibility, parks, the environment and historic preservation, BHA said.

The meeting included presentations about the alternatives that have been proposed since DOT announced its plans, including an option to turn the BQE into a park from the Bjark Ingels Group, an option developed by city Comptroller Scott Stringer and one by Brooklyn Heights Association-commissioned architect Mark Wouters.

Read the Brooklyn Heights Association's full blog post about the meeting here.