NIAGARA FALLS — While one state agency is trying to figure out whether to remove the Robert Moses Parkway, another is making improvements to it.
“As we’re moving in one direction, it appears the State of New York is moving in a different direction,” Mayor Paul A. Dyster said this week. “Why would you build that now? You’re building something that’s almost certain to be torn apart.”
The state Department of Transportation fired up construction equipment late last week to continue work on the road, two months after residents gave the state Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation their input on whether the road should even exist anymore.
DOT officials contend that the current work, aimed at completing pedestrian access along the southbound lanes, vehicle traffic in the northbound lanes and access from Main Street to the Niagara Gorge Discover Center, is compatible with any future plans for the road.
“We feel that regardless of the ultimate fate of the Moses, this work needs to be done,” said regional DOT spokeswoman Susan Surdej. “In the big picture, it’s sort of irrelevant in the future of the Robert Moses Parkway if it’s decided in the future the Robert Moses would need to be removed. You would need to create access between Main Street and the Discovery Center.”
Many residents support the part of the city’s comprehensive plan that calls for parkway removal. They see the roadway, built a half-century ago between the Falls and Lewiston, as a barrier to waterfront access and a reason for the lack of economic development along Main Street.
The state parks department, the city and two other state agencies agreed in 2006 to hold a public scoping section to determine the future of the northern section.
What resulted were six alternatives, ranging from refinishing the deteriorating road to completely removing the parkway. After public meetings, state parks officials said they would combine ideas from the alternatives to present to the public. A final decision would be made by late 2013, a state consultant said.
Then came the construction last week, which Surdej said involves temporary widening of the road so a median separating northbound and southbound traffic can be built. She noted that the project was a continuation of earlier efforts to improve pedestrian access along the road.
“This project has been progressing for quite some time,” Surdej said, adding that city and state officials met a year ago to discuss the project. “This wasn’t an unanticipated project.”
Dyster said he was told the state was “dusting off” the second phase of its 2001 pilot program, which called for adding pedestrian and bike traffic to the roadway’s edges.
“This is something that would have made sense in 2001 or 2004,” Dyster said. “Now we’re in the midst of a scoping process where we’ve asked our citizens to come out and to identify alternatives.”
City Council Chairman Sam Fruscione agreed.
“We’re trying to redirect traffic to Main Street for our business district and this kind of puts another foot in the grave as far as this thing never being removed,” Fruscione said. “We want to make it difficult [to widen the parkway].”
There also has been doubt about whether the state would have the funds necessary to remove the parkway in the city if that alternative were selected. A state parks architect previously said that “the whole issue of cost is very, very relative.”
State DOT Commissioner Joan McDonald told The Buffalo News in July that residents “should not be concerned about funding” and should be concerned about “making wise investments.”
“It seems odd to me that there’s never any money for anything we want to do, but when they want to do something, somehow money magically appears,” Dyster told the Council on Monday.
“In the grand scheme of things, it’s a relatively low-cost project,” Surdej said. “It’s not a multimillion-dollar project. We don’t think our efforts are wasted.”
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