Politics
40 FEBRUARY 2019 I LIC COURIER I www.qns.com
An eco-friendly
future for
Rikers
BY BILL PARRY
With an eye on enhanced
resiliency and sustain-ability,
Councilman Cos-ta
Constantinides, the
chair of the Environmental Protection
Committee, put forth his bold vision for
the future of Rikers Island, and eventu-ally
the north end of Astoria.
During his “State of the District” ad-dress
at P.S. 2 in East Elmhurst last
week, Constantinides shared his plan for
a greener Queens — and it had nothing
to do with developers or an extra runway
for LaGuardia Airport.
“With the prison on Rikers Island
closing in the next five to 10 years, the
city will soon have 400 acres of space
open for redevelopment,” Constantinides
said. “We will have a unique opportunity
to solve several different environmental
problems that have bedeviled us for
decades.”
Namely, the section of western
Queens known as “Asthma Alley” which
is home to almost half of the city’s power
plants. Constantinides said his office had
begun a collaboration with the CUNY
Law School Center for Urban Environ-mental
Reform to “determine the best
use of space” from an environmental
perspective.
“Astoria resident and professor Re-becca
Bratspies demonstrated that,
based off projections from the Lippman
Commission’s report on Rikers Island,
renewables installed on the island could
be used to replace most, if not all, of the
plants that have been built in this city in
the last two decades,” Constantinides
said. “What’s more, this should also
eave us plenty of space to build a new,
state-of-the-art wastewater treatment
facility that would allow us to potentially
retire several older sewage treatment
plants in north Queens and the Bronx.”
Constantinides said his plan would
establish solar or wind fields tied to
large-scale batteries large enough to
store enough energy to potentially power
more than 2 million homes.
“This is not some far-flung dream of
a distant future,” he said. “This is within
our grasp now, and we need to begin
the transition away from these plants
now. Too much is at stake to wait around
any longer.”
Constantinides also called on the
city’s Department of Transportation
to conduct a comprehensive review
of the 4.5-mile Astoria Boulevard,
which runs from the RFK-Triborough
Bridge to Citi Field. Despite efforts
to keep large trucks merging onto
the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway,
the roadway has still seen signifi-cant
backups and accidents in the
past year.
The councilman also proposed a new
station house with a parking garage to
replace the 50-year-old home of the
114th Precinct, recognizing the current
layout leads to blocked intersections,
sidewalks and overpasses.
“This has created a traffic nightmare
around Astoria Boulevard and 35th
Street,” Constantinides said. “My office
has fielded complaints about this for
years, and trust me, we hear you.”
From
mean to
green?
Photo courtesy of Constantinides' office
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