It should be an attainable goal to wean trucks off getting from Point A to Point B without passing through the City of Hudson, but the means to attaining that goal is not clear. Eliminating the second truck route through the city, the one that enters from the south on Route 9G and didn't exist until the 1980s, would seem to be a step in the right direction. Forced to continue east on Route 23, truckers might decide to stay on Route 23 all the way to Route 9H instead of turning onto Route 9 and following the tortuous route through Hudson, which involves two right turns, not easily executed by an eighteen wheeler.
Although the hope is that eliminating the Route 9G truck route will encourage some trucks to bypass the city altogether, residents of Worth Avenue fear it will double the number of trucks that pass by their homes on the Route 9 truck route.
In a post published on June 12, Gossips made this suggestion regarding the proposal to eliminate the Route 9G truck route:
An effective way to study the impact might simply be to shut down the Route 9G/23B route for a few weeks and see what happens. Do all the trucks going from one part of Greenport to another part of Greenport take the Route 9 truck route through Hudson, or do they find another way to get to their destination? It seems pretty straightforward, but DOT may not think that kind of empirical research is practicable.
This suggestion inspired Councilmember Margaret Morris (First Ward), who chairs the ad hoc Truck Route Committee, to send me an article from The Guardian about efforts in Amsterdam (that's the Netherlands not New York) to improve air quality in the city. Some of the strategies sound like Tactical Urbanism, the ideology that moved decision makers in Hudson to select Arterial to execute the "Complete Streets" improvements that are a major part of the City's DRI-funded projects. But of greater relevance to the current situation confronting Hudson is that, in Amsterdam, they shut down the Weesperstraat, one of the busiest streets in the city, for six weeks, "in an experiment to test driver tolerance." Why can't we do this here in Hudson, in New York, in the United States, to see how truck drivers respond if they are denied the 9G/23B route through our city?
COPYRIGHT 2023 CAROLE OSTERINK
If the truck route were in Europe, I could see people getting so fed up that they would long ago have formed a human chain in front of the trucks to stop all the traffic for a few hours. Get arrested, repeat every two weeks. Make a point, force the issue. In America, we talk and talk and write and there is little spirit for action or activism left, myself included. There's no money in activism, and it doesn't translate well on a phone.
ReplyDeleteGood idea, Carole. I don't know about you or the Planning Board or the residents but I'm really getting tired of this issue and commend the Valley Alliance, Margaret Morris and yourself for keeping at it.
ReplyDeleteAnother good step would be to eliminate the Colarusso gravel trucks heading back eastward on Columbia St. thru the heart of the minority neighborhood. That stretch is not part of the designated truck route, and it's only happening because the Common Council made a huge mistake and voted some years ago to give the company special permission.
ReplyDeleteThis comment was submitted by email from Robert Walker:
ReplyDeleteI’m a Worth Avenue resident, just two doors down from the corner of Worth and Warren. Although my street could be negatively impacted in a 6 week test, I think it’s a good idea. That said, I think more would also need to be done to make Worth Avenue less appealing to truckers. For a start, one idea could be to add a speed bump at the Hudson border where the speed limit changes from 45 to 30. On that note, adding a more permanent speed radar by the police would help, too.
Today I crossed the street as two trucks turned off Warren onto Worth. One was oversized with an accompanying smaller truck. Those two trucks, which were back to back on Worth, took over the entire two lanes of Worth. They stopped traffic, forced cars onto driveways, and forced me to walk back into the Farrell’s drive to avoid the oversized cargo.
Hudson is a wonderful city, but the trucks are a stain on the quality of life of its citizens. I say this as the stepson of a trucker. The trucks would also be happier without the Hudson roads.