L YES!
BY MARK HALLUM
Ahead of schedule and under
budget, the Canarsie Tunnel
linking the L line between
Brooklyn and Manhattan is
fully operational as of Monday
after a year-long partial
shutdown, Governor Andrew
Cuomo announced on April 26.
But there’s little pomp and
circumstance to celebrate the
completion of the project thanks
to the COVID-19 epidemic that’s
caused 90% ridership loss and
reduced subway service to “essential”
levels just to keep essential
workers moving.
On April 26, Cuomo was
nonetheless optimistic about
what he deemed to be an innovative
accomplishment in unprecedented
times, with not only opposition
to the new approach to
repairing the tunnel but also
the adjustments forced on New
Cuomo cans special election for Bushwick
council seat, infuriating progressives
4 COURIER LIFE, MAY 1–7, 2020
Yorkers from COVID-19.
“It was a thunderstorm of
opposition, but we did it anyway
and we went ahead with
it. We rebuilt the tunnel and
the tunnel is now better than
before with all these new techniques,
it opens today,” Cuomo
said.
According to the governor’s
offi ce, the project fi nished up
$100 million below budget; it
was originally projected to cost
$920 million.
Cuomo said full service
would resume on the L train
starting April 27 under the
MTA’s Essential Service Plan,
which transit offi cials announced
early on in the pandemic
as a 30% service decrease
on subways and buses.
A host of repair jobs and upgrades
will continue through
fall on both sides of the East
L train riders can rest easy knowing service will be back to normal, even if life isn’t. File photo
River, such as new station entrances
and exits, elevators,
and street restoration at the
Bedford Avenue stop in Williamsburg.
The Authority will complete
installing two new substations
at Maspeth Avenue and Harrison
Place in May or June,
which will power more trains
to run along the busy line.
Builders will also fi nish
work on the fan plant at N. Seventh
Street in June, according
to Cuomo’s offi ce.
The free transfer between
the L train at Livonia Avenue
and the 3 train at Junius Street
in Brownsville will become
permanent, as the agency announced
in February.
Meanwhile the free transfer
between the G train at Broadway
and the JMZ line stations
at Lorimer Street and Hewes
Street will phase out by June 1
as riders “get used to using the
L again,” the agency’s website
states.
In the days before the
COVID-19 crisis, New Yorkers
saw the closure of the projected
full closure of the Canarsie Tunnel
with ominous regard for the
local economies of Brooklyn.
But in the early months of 2019,
Cuomo and a team of experts
from Columbia and Cornell
University intervened with a
different approach to the Superstorm
Sandy-related repairs.
Instead of closing the tunnel
entirely for 15 to 18 months,
the bench-walls of the structure
running beneath the East
River were repaired one tube
at a time, with closures taking
place during overnights and on
weekends.
Additional reporting by
Kevin Duggan
MTA completes L train tunnel
work early and below budget
BY KEVIN DUGGAN
Gov. Andrew Cuomo cancelled
the June 23 special
election for the 37th Council
District seat in Bushwick via
executive order on April 25,
provoking criticism from progressive
pols who said the race
was rigged in favor of a party
favorite.
“This is by far the most blatant
anti-democratic power
grab,” said candidate Sandy
Nurse in a statement. “Unless
Mayor de Blasio steps in to enforce
the City Charter and the
court agrees, there will only be
one candidate left on the ballot.
That is not democracy.”
Nurse was vying for the seat
against local district leader
Darma Diaz, who has the support
of the both Brooklyn Democratic
Party leader Rodneyse Bichotte
and former Councilman
Rafael Espinal, who abruptly
vacated the position in January
to take on a new gig heading the
Freelancers Union.
There were initially two separate
elections on two separate
dates — a non-partisan special
election to fi ll the seat immediately
that was slated to take
place on April 28, and a primaries
on June 23 to nominate a
candidate for the general election
in November.
The winner of the special
election would have served as
the district’s Council member
until January, when the winner
of the June and November
elections would have taken
over to serve the remainder of
Espinal’s term until the end of
2021.
In an effort to limit the
amount of times Brooklynites
headed to the voting booth in
the middle of the pandemic,
Cuomo initially moved the special
election to coincide with
the June 23 Council primary
and the now-canceled presidential
nominating contest.
Now, Cuomo decided to take
another turn, axing the special
election entirely, thereby simplifying
the ballot for voters —
while also kicking insurgents
out of the race.
Since Nurse only made the
ballot for the special and not the
primary election, that move effectively
removes her from the
contest and results in Diaz running
unopposed in the primary
and being all but guaranteed a
victory in the heavily-blue district
in November.
Cuomo’s decision to cancel
the Bushwick Council primary
on April 24 came a full day after
he called off other special elections,
like the race for Queens
borough president. Why Cuomo
waited an additional 24 hours
to nix the Brooklyn race is unclear,
and Cuomo’s press offi
ce did not return a request for
comment to clarify.
Without a special election,
the district — which also
stretches into Cypress Hills,
Brownsville, Ocean Hill, and
East New York — will go without
a dedicated legislative representative
for almost a year
from when Espinal resigned.
Council Speaker Corey
Johnson will continue to manage
the district for the rest of
2020, but Nurse — in a statement
signed by a host of progressive
electeds and political
clubs — accused Cuomo of depriving
a predominantly black
and Hispanic area of having a
full-time rep in the city legislature.
“By canceling the special
election yesterday, the governor
is saying that a high needs
African-American and Latino
community should lack representation
for nearly a full year,”
she said.
Diaz said Cuomo’s decision
came as a surprise but she supported
it. The district leader
was previously eager to get the
seat fi lled as soon as possible so
that the neighborhoods would
have a representative.
However, the politico claimed
that voters could be confused
by having to vote twice for the
same offi ce on the same day and
that — if they choose to vote by
mail — sending in two different
ballot sheets would further risk
spreading the virus.
“It was hard to explain that
it was two elections in one day
— that eliminated confusion
about that,” Diaz said. “If we
can wait till January 1 and save
one life, I want to save one life.”
“This is by far the most blatant,
anti-democratic power grab.”