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Caribbean Life, April 14-20, 2022
Making waves: Getting on board with
linking LaGuardia and NYC Ferry
By Queens Borough
President Donovan Richards
and Councilmember Amanda
Farias
For decades, New York City
and State lawmakers have been
debating innovative new ways,
free of hassle and high costs,
to easily and more efficiently
connect all New Yorkers to
LaGuardia Airport. But there is
no debate around how untenable
transportation options to
and from the airport currently
are for the vast majority of
New Yorkers. Whether you’re
traveling by car or by MTA,
you’re almost guaranteed to sit
in a sea of snarled highway
traffic, pumping climate-killing
clouds of harmful emissions in
the process.
It is abundantly clear that
we must expand public transit
options that benefit workingclass
families and the thousands
of New Yorkers who work
at the airport, as well as the
environment we all share. To
achieve this goal, we need an
option that is affordable and
accessible to New Yorkers in
every borough — the obvious
answer is NYC Ferry.
We are a city surrounded by
water, yet we have never come
close to leveraging our waterways
in the manner we should.
Not only can these boats move
hundreds of people at one time,
but the NYC Ferry is environmentally
friendly. It takes
countless cars off our bridges
and roads, furthers our mission
to combat climate change
by lowering vehicle-generated
emissions and creates direct
connections between communities
that otherwise are difficult
to access via bus or subway.
In our respective roles as
Queens Borough President and
as Chair of the Committee on
Economic Development, which
oversees NYC Ferry, we have
been advocating for ferry expansion,
outer-borough prioritization,
and increasing transit
equity citywide. So when we
both saw a ferry proposal as one
of the more than a dozen possible
LaGuardia transit options
released by the Port Authority
of New York and New Jersey
last month, we knew this was
an area we could partner in our
shared push for outer-borough
transit equity.
To create direct connections
between the Bronx, Brooklyn,
Manhattan, Queens and
LaGuardia Airport, we recommend
adding a permanent stop
on the NYC Ferry’s Astoria line,
which will give countless residents
of Long Island City, Astoria,
Roosevelt Island, the Upper
East Side, Northwest Brooklyn
and all ferries that connect at
34th street an affordable, inclusive,
and sustainable method
to access LaGuardia, considered
Op - E d
the only major U.S. airport
without direct rail service. The
World’s Fair Marina, adjacent to
LaGuardia, has existing infrastructure
to support boating,
representing a logical starting
place for any community-led
conversation about such a plan
to establish ferry service to
LaGuardia.
The NYCEDC, which runs
the ferry operations, released a
2018/2019 Feasibility Study on
NYC Ferry Expansion, exploring
the possibility of having a
NYC Ferry stop at LaGuardia
Airport. While the study stated
that, “On average, a direct
ferry would take around the
same amount of time as existing
transit options,” we believe
the direct and affordable nature
of ferry service to LaGuardia
would be a preferable transit
option for larger families, those
with disabilities, those who
want to lessen their dependence
on cars, lower-income individuals,
and airport workers alike.
Anyone who questions the
need for new transit options to
connect residents and employees
to LaGuardia should look
no further than the economic
impacts the airport has on not
just New York City or New York
State, but the entire region. In
just the month of February,
more than 1.5 million passengers
flew in and out of LaGuardia,
which employs nearly
12,000 people and generated
more than $2.3 billion in total
wages in 2020.
We have to, as local leaders,
explore more creative solutions
for how we can best meet the
needs of our City’s most in-need
families, as our already strained
roadway and public transit networks
have been pushed to the
brink. The idea to add a NYC
Ferry stop at LaGuardia onto
the existing Astoria Ferry line
should act as a catalyst for
thinking more boldly to meet
New Yorkers where they are at.
We need to explore how we can
get Bronxites and Brooklynites
alike to LaGuardia and beyond
so that every corner of our
City is accessible to everyone.
If we’re serious about being a
leader in recovery, resiliency,
accessibility and modern transportation,
it’s time to think
outside the box.
A budget is more than just
dollars and cents. It represents
the needs of the neighbors we
serve as elected officials and
the values we hold as human
beings. The projects we prioritize
for funding must reflect
that. Expanding ferry service to
LaGuardia Airport brings with
it numerous benefits that cannot
be ignored. We urge our
colleagues in government at all
levels to join us in this push for
expansion and equity.
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