6 JANUARY 19, 2017 RIDGEWOOD TIMES WWW.QNS.COM Here's how to prepare for the big bridge mess BY ANTHONY GIUDICE AGIUDICE@RIDGEWOODTIMES.COM @A_GIUDICEREPORT Photo by Anthony Giudice/QNS Preparations for the work on the Metropolitan Avenue Bridge are beginning. Get ready to see some big changes at the end of the month when construction work on the Metropolitan Avenue Bridge at the Ridgewood/Middle Village border finally gets underway. According to the project’s community liaison, starting Tuesday, Jan. 17, Variable Message Signs (VMS) have been set up to alert drivers of the upcoming construction on the severely damaged bridge deck at the intersection of Metropolitan Avenue and Fresh Pond Road. The VMS will be set up at these locations: • Forest Avenue and Metropolitan Avenue; • Metropolitan Avenue and 69th Street; • Fresh Pond Road and Palmetto Street; and • Fresh Pond Road and 60th Avenue. On Monday, Jan. 30, the direction of traffi c fl ow 60th Lane between Metropolitan Avenue and Eliot Avenue will be reversed from northbound (goring from Metropolitan Avenue to Eliot Avenue) to southbound (from Eliot Avenue to Metropolitan Avenue). This change in direction will last for the duration of the construction. As an added safety measure a temporary traffi c light has been installed at the intersection of 60th Lane and Metropolitan Avenue. On Tuesday, Jan. 31, aft er nearly six months of delays and holdups, Phase 1 of construction will begin with the implementation of Work Zone Traffi c Controls. Detours associated with Phase 1 will go into eff ect restricting turns at the intersection. Ridgewood/M.V. bridge work will fi nally start this month The intersection of Metropolitan Avenue and Fresh Pond Road, looking east. BY ANGELA MATUA AMATUA@RIDGEWOODTIMES.COM/@ ANGELAMATUA It seems like starting over again. More than 6 months after it was fi rst announced that the city would begin work to rehabilitate the Metropolitan Avenue Bridge deck on the Ridgewood/Middle Village border, offi cials said that repairs should fi nally get underway this month. The emergency work — which was slated to begin aft er the Fourth of July holiday weekend last year — will replace the badly deteriorated deck of the bridge over the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) at Fresh Pond Road and Metropolitan Avenue. The city fi rst announced the work in January 2016 and hoped to have Stage 1 of repairs completed before MTA’s work on the M train begins in summer 2017, which will involve shuttle buses traveling along Metropolitan Avenue. It was then rescheduled for August due to a delay in the review and approval of drawings with the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR), which owns the tracks, and approval of vendors and subcontractors. The work was further delayed until October due to the contractor not being able to secure the appropriate permits for the work. Gary Giordano, the district manager of Community Board 5, announced at a meeting on Jan. 11 that repairs should offi cially begin at the end of January. He also added that he is concerned about the eff ects of the M train repairs that will occur simultaneously on the project. “We still don’t have a defi nitive date for the Metropolitan Bridge project,” he said. “We’re told, hopefully, now by the end of January. But we’re gonna run into that problem with the M train project starting July 1 which they want to keep to and this contractor, if they ever get on the job, they’re going to have to work around what’s going on with the M train project.” Giordano was referring to scheduled reconstruction of the Myrtle Avenue train line that will result in a two-month full suspension of M train service between Middle Village-Metropolitan Photo: Anthony Giudice/RIDGEWOOD TIMES Avenue and Myrtle Avenue-Broadway. That project is scheduled to take place in July and August, and shuttle buses will operate in place of the M train — and will be required to travel through the Metropolitan Avenue/Fresh Pond Road intersection. As for the Metropolitan Avenue bridge project, once the barriers are put in place, 60th Lane will be converted to a southbound-only roadway. Once construction begins, the Department of Transportation (DOT) will place traffi c enforcement agents at the scene seven days a week to help guide drivers and pedestrians around the area. DOT will be surveying area and the impact on traffi c that construction will have to help keep traffi c fl owing as best as possible. “The new temporary traffi c signal and signage at Metropolitan Avenue and 60th Lane to support the fi rst phase of construction is currently being installed in anticipation of the start of Phase 1,” a DOT spokesperson said. “DOT expects the project to begin this winter.” Ridgewood seniors get musical treat Nearly 300 seniors got the chance to hear some amazing tunes from the MAC Saxophone Quartet at the Peter Cardella Senior Center on Fresh Pond Road in Ridgewood on Jan. 10. The quartet, comprised of Valentino Funaro, Stefano Pecci, Luis Lanzarini, and Alex Sebastianutto, performed a mix of classical South American melodies and traditional Italian melodies for an hour. Photos courtesy of Peter Cardella Senior Center
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