EDITORIAL
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TIMESLEDGER | Q 16 NS.COM | DEC. 20-26, 2019
READERS WRITE
Here are some ways the MTA
New York City Transit can assist
beleaguered car cleaners at end
of subway line terminal stations,
including: #7 - Flushing Main
Street, F - Jamaica 179th Street,
E,J & Z - Jamaica Center Parsons/
Archer, M - Middle Village
Metropolitan Avenue, A - Ozone
Park Lefferts Blvd, N & W - Astoria
Ditmars Blvd., A -Far Rockaway
Mott Avenue and A -Rockaway
Park Beach 116th Street.
Every year, judges sentence
non-violent offenders to perform
several hundred hours of community
service. Why not assign
some of these individuals
the task of helping clean subway
cars? How difficult can it be to
push a broom, pick up trash or
mop a subway car floor? Why not
ask any major business, college
or hospital who benefit from subway
stations adjacent to their facility
to sponsor cleaning crews
as well?
NYC Transit should also consider
installing separate cans
for recycling newspapers, plastic
and glass along with regular
garbage. Selling advertising on
the side of cans could generate
revenue to help cover the costs of
more frequent off-peak and latenight
collection and disposal.
If asked, the NYC Department
of Sanitation could do the same
on the street adjacent to subway
station entrances. All of the
above could assist in keeping our
fleet of over 6,000 subway cars
clean.
Larry Penner
Great Neck
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How to keep subway cars clean
It has been a tough stretch in Queens for the
city’s Department of Environmental Protection following
Thanksgiving weekend, when raw sewage
flowed into so many homes in South Ozone Park.
The DEP was called on the carpet for its slow
response to that by elected officials in southeast
Queens, and now Comptroller Scott Stringer is
scrutinizing the agency’s mismanagement and
shoddy oversight of city-owned rain gardens across
the borough.
Millions of taxpayer dollars have been spent on
curbside mini gardens that are meant to absorb
stormwater, prevent flooding, and ease the pressure
on sewers systems reducing contamination in waterways.
But a new audit found visible maintenance
deficiencies at 95 of the 102 rain gardens that auditors
visited in Queens, Brooklyn and the Bronx.
Additionally, 67 of 102 sampled rain gardens
exhibited two or more conditions that DEP’s own
maintenance manual can impede their proper
functioning including sediment buildup in the
rain garden’s gravel strips, planting areas, and
curb cuts; compacted and depleted soil that needed
to be raked and replenished; weeds and overgrown
plants that need pruning; and missing plants and
trees.
“Seven years after our city was devastated by
Superstorm Sandy, we cannot afford to shirk our
responsibility to improve its resiliency,” Stringer
said. “We must use every tool we have to lessen the
devastating impacts of future storms.”
You would think an agency known as the Department
of Environmental Protection would be
able to handle a tool such as the rain garden. This
is about climate change, resiliency and government
waste plus the protection of streets, homes,
and small businesses.
“DEP must step up to the plate and properly
maintain these vital resources,” Stringer said.
“We cannot win the battle to protect New Yorkers
against the next superstorm and keep our waterways
clean if we allow these vital resources to fall
into disrepair due to neglect.”
The DEP’s slow response to the raw sewage
flooding was bad enough, but it was caused by
the blockage of a sewer main buried 40 feet below
ground and blocked by roadway infrastructure.
Rain gardens are on the surface and easily maintained.
There is no excuse for the DEP to not clean
up their act on the rain gardens.
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