The notoriously accident-prone Queens Boulevard boasts twelve lanes for motor vehicles at its widest points, but the DOT refuses to cede one of those lanes for cyclists, despite a citywide boom in bicycle commuting. Last month cycling advocates held a somber rally to demand a bike lane on Queens Boulevard, and installed a white ghost bike to commemorate the death of 38-year-old James Langergaard, who was killed by a car as he crossed the boulevard on the evening of August 14th. But a Daily News reporter has learned that the DOT has not even evaluated the possibility of a Queens Boulevard bikeway in recent years.
A Freedom of Information Act request for documents related to the issue yielded only 10 pages of paperwork from the DOT in the past three years. And most of those were letters to local elected officials insisting that such a bike lane was not an option. It's a surprisingly retrograde stance for the DOT, which has been robustly adding bike lanes throughout the city in recent years. In one of the letters, the Queens borough commissioner for the DOT vaguely wrote, "For many reasons, Queens Blvd. is not included in the [master] plan, and we do not envision including it in the near future."
But at least one local politician it throwing his support behind the bike lane brigade. Daniel Dromm, councilman-elect for District 25, tells the News, "This is more than a recreational issue, this is a transportation issue. They need to make more improvements for cyclists." Between 2000 and 2005, accidents along Queens Blvd. injured about 500 pedestrians and 100 bikers, according Transportation Alternatives. In the last three years, the DOT has installed more than 50 miles of bike lanes in Queens, including a lane that runs along Skillman Ave., parallel to part of Queens Blvd.
