By Bob Harris
Residents from the Hillcrest Estates Civic Association have been writing and speaking for months about their unhappiness with the noise, trash, drinking and lewd behavior outside of Gate 7 on 170th Street on the west side of St. John’s campus.
On June 12 Community Board 8 voted to oppose the school’s proposals to obtain a variance in the zoning law to add 226 more parking spaces on the roof of the three adjacent garages at the corner of Union Turnpike and 170th Street by making them one, and to build a new 477-space four-story garage with rooftop parking on the campus along the Grand Central Parkway Service Road just east of 168th Street.
The residents to the west of the campus along 170th Street and 168th Street have complained for years about the bright lights from the roof of the existing garage and the playing fields on the campus. The vote against the rooftop parking of the existing garage was 18 pro and 20 against. If St. John’s University had tried harder to correct these issues, there would not have been so many bad feelings in the community and perhaps three more votes might have been available.
As I recently explained in a Civic Scene column, the combined actions of the civic associations along Union Turnpike, the 107th Precinct and the Liquor License Committee of CB 8 had solved the noise, public lewd behavior and trash caused by patrons of the bars along Union Turnpike from Utopia Parkway to 193rd Street. If St. John’s had just tried a little harder, it might have obtained the Union Turnpike and 170th Street zoning variance.
The variance for the new garage on the Grand Central Parkway Service Road was turned down by a unanimous vote. They decided against it because of the heavy traffic and because the exit/entrance of the GCP at 168th Street would have been just a few feet east of the new garage and the street light on l68th Street, which is diagonally across from Thomas A. Edison Vocational and Technical High School.
The representative of St. John’s commented that the school could build this garage as of right because it is a community facility. The problem is that the Zoning Resolution limits what they can build to 225 parking spaces with no rooftop parking. Some members of CB 8 seemed to think that this comment was a threat, while I think it was a statement of fact. The rights of community facilities are infamous. The school did admit they will have to spend a lot more if they have to build several new garages at different locations on campus.
That current garage with the bright lights apparently was built in such a way so they could take down the barriers and make rooftop parking across the three buildings, but they need this variance. Perhaps if the school had modified the lights and presented the idea that the lights might keep down crime and rowdiness then they might reach a satisfactory solution.
All in all, the school and the neighbors are not communicating. Despite formal meetings, the neighbors feel that the school ignores them and does what it wants. The school seems to feel that the neighbors want too much.
Well, the homes were there prior to the school, and the school keeps getting bigger, thus causing congestion and disrupting the community’s “quality of life.” The civic associations aren’t going away and neither is the school. One of the visitors at the meeting was Assemblyman Brian McLaughlin. His new district will take in much of CB 8, including St. John’s University. He will find this an interesting area to represent.
If the school wants to pursue the variances, it can go to the Queens Borough Board. Attending this CB 8 meeting was Deputy Borough President Karen Koslowitz, who was a City Council member until she had to leave due to term limits. She will report what she learned to the borough president and the other council members and community board managers who sit on the Borough Board.
The issue then can be pursued at the Board of Standards and Appeals, which can heed the vote of CB 8 or issue the variance. SJU will have to build because the Dormitory Authority of the State of New York, which gave the university the money to build the dorms, says that more parking is mandatory.
All in all, unless they get together, the one hurt the least will have won!
Good and Bad News of the Week
People still are suffering from the tragedy of Sept. 11. There is a plan to plant Freedom Trees in the neighborhoods of the victims as a way of honoring them. Of the 51 City Council members, 34 are sponsoring this idea. It is Council Resolution 318. Councilman Joseph Addabbo, Parks Committee chairman who is a former civic association president, will hold hearings. They have to decide on what type of trees to plant, where to put them and how to pay for them. There will be public hearings. It sounds like a good idea.
