In fact, until 1940, there were more limited-access highways in the New York region than in all the rest of the country combined, said Zupan of the Regional Plan Association. Those highways have been showing their age for years, with treacherous twists and turns, and poorly designed ramps that make them dangerous even when they aren't clogged with traffic. Most of these arteries are so crucial to New York that it's impossible to contemplate getting rid of them. It will begin next spring and be completed in 2004, state DOT officials said. The DOT scaled down a more ambitious project to the east after getting complaints from residents about widening the highway.
Current plans call only for the road surface to be rehabilitated.
The Gowanus Expressway in Brooklyn is also long overdue for an overhaul, although experts disagree on the best plan. The Regional Plan Association has proposed putting the expressway in an underground tunnel, a plan intended to improve the quality of life in Red Hook, Sunset Park and other Brooklyn neighborhoods that suffer noise and pollution from the elevated highway. The DOT is conducting an environmental impact statement on various options, including a cheaper rehabilitation of the existing viaduct. In the south Bronx, community activists are calling on the state DOT to tear down the Sheridan Expressway, one of several limited-access highways that divide the Bronx. The Sheridan, which connects the Bruckner and Cross Bronx Expressways, duplicates other routes through the Bronx.