I recently had the privilege of attending a Nets game at the
brand spanking new Barclays Center near downtown Brooklyn .
The arena was specifically built in that area as it was constructed over a
major transportation hub, the biggest one in Brooklyn .
While ease of access through public transportation rivals that of Manhattan , the area is
notorious for its unfriendliness to automobile traffic.
After the game we took a walk around the arena to check it out, and we discovered that directly behind the arena there were two large bicycle “parking lots”. I tried to get a decent picture, but with all the weird lighting, the pictures I took could not do it justice:
I would say that I left the arena about a half hour after the game, and the bicycle parking lot was still a third full. (These pictures were taken a little while later)
The whole idea intrigued me, so I decided to do a little
research on it. The Arena is situated on top of the LIRR rail yards above
Atlantic terminal. Atlantic terminal is the Brooklyn
terminus of the LIRR, a major transit hub that consists of nine subway lines
(with two more lines less than two blocks away), and 10 bus lines within a
block radius.
Not only did the bicycle parking lot make sense in regards
to traveling to the arena, as the area is clearly automobile unfriendly with
legendary traffic and biking provides an alternative, but I figured that these
lots may even be used as a method of access to Atlantic terminal.
Unfortunately there are no recently updated aerial images of
the completed arena; the best I could find was a satellite image of the arena while
it was still under construction, and which I’ve labeled:
When searching for the schematics of the bicycle lots, the
only place that had updated information was, believe it or not, the NBA
website, where I learned that the lots currently have spaces for 400 bikes in what
is termed “free and secure bicycle parking”.
Digging deeper I discovered a much longer back-story,
according to an anti-arena watchdog group known as the “Atlantic Yards Report”:
when the developer of the area, Bruce Ratner, ran into some community opposition,
in order to pacify the masses he promised to “provide any ticketholder
traveling to the arena by bicycle with free indoor bicycle storage in a secure,
manned facility designed to accommodate at least 400 bicycles on the arena
block,(to encourage people to leave their cars at home)”. Yet when the arena
was opened this past Spetember, only the aforementioned outdoor lots were
available. Apparently, a structure known as “Building 3” was supposed to have
housed the indoor & guarded lots across the street from the arena but has
not been completed yet. No timeframe is yet available for its completion. Many
opponents are dismayed, as not only has the indoor parking not been realized,
but the outdoor lot is not manned and secure as was promised.
Sam Schwartz of Gridlock
Sam fame was hired as a consultant for the developer Forest
City
Mr. Schwartz was asked about the “Transportation Demand
Management Plan (TDM)” in which the bike lots would be available 24/7. And that
is where the really interesting part of all this really begins.
While the bike lots would provide a perfect alternative for
traveling to events at the arena, utilizing them at other times in conjunction
with the transportation hub has yet to be fully realized. Considering that
large portions of Brooklyn are well served by
subway, it would seem unlikely that there would be a major demand for biking
from one’s home to Atlantic Terminal, parking in the lot, and then taking the
subway to one’s final destination. Most riders would either ride to their final
destinations, or to the subway station nearest to their homes. The unrealized
aspect of this is the LIRR terminal; the vast majority of people coming into
Brooklyn from Long Island in the morning rush
are not at there final destination when they reach Atlantic Terminal. They must
utilize another form of transportation to reach their destination. Additionally,
reverse commuters going from Brooklyn to Long Island
to reach their place of work are relatively small in number.
The LIRR prohibits bikes on board during the peak hours. If
only there was a safe and secure area that one could leave his or her bike
overnight near Atlantic Terminal, and then use the bike to reach their final
destination. Then at the end of the work day, one would return the bike to the guarded
bike lots and hop on the railroad, while knowing that the bike would be safe
overnight. Unfortunately, Mr. Schwartz was not able to provide details on such
a development, which usually means that it has been ruled out for the time
being. But at least there are easily developed options for a sustainable system
in Downtown Brooklyn’s future.
POSTSCRIPT
Clearer images of Lot#1 I found online:
No comments:
Post a Comment