Read Brian Ketcham's Daily News op ed

Brian Ketcham

The following is an excerpt from Brian Ketcham's recent op-ed in the Daily News:

"The folks at Willets Point United hired me to investigate the traffic and transit implications of this project. I’m a transportation and environmental engineer with decades of experience. What I found was that the project would generate so much traffic that it would gridlock local access roads and surrounding expressways. I also found that the EDC environmental impact statement was replete with erroneous assumptions, bad data, and outright falsehoods.

The project has gone ahead nonetheless, and the EDC handed over the development rights — behind closed doors — to Sterling Equities, a $4.6 billion real estate company and owner of the New York Mets. Sterling Equities teamed with The Related Companies, one of New York’s richest and most powerful developers, to form the Queens Development Group, which became the final recipient of the development rights for Willets Point.

The project has required massive public subsidies: $250 million for 23 acres of land at the site; $35 million for sewer construction; more than $66 million for the construction of new highway ramps; almost $100 million in a grant of taxpayer funds to the Queens Development Group; $42 million in direct financial assistance to the developer-a total of $536 million ponied up by taxpayers.

Today, the threat of redevelopment and eminent domain seizure has already driven out many of the businesses that once thrived in the Willets Point neighborhood. Few of the displaced businesses have successfully relocated.

For this reason 33 owners of Willets Point businesses filed suit in February 2014 against the EDC, Sterling Equities, The Related Companies, and the Queens Development Group. The lawsuit alleges that “there was no lawful relocation plan for current commercial tenants,” that “the relocation assistance has been ineffective,” and that the city’s failure to implement a legitimate relocation plan is a violation of federal law.

Eliminating taxpayer support for a billionaire’s boondoggle like the Willets Point Project will not make much of a dent in the level of extreme inequality in New York City. But it would make a statement that it is time to take a stand and help the working poor defend against the depredations of the rich."

EDC UnPhased: What About You?

The NYC EDC. frustrated in its efforts to gain approvals for ramps that will grind the Van Wyck to a halt, is now claiming that its partial first phase of development can move forward without any stinkin' ramps. Yet, these are the same sleight of handers that tried to slip fraudulent traffic data passed NYSDOT, only to have WPU's Brian Ketcham smacked the effort down over one year ago.

The real danger here is that it will be all of the surrounding communities-Flushing, Corona, East Elmhurst and College Point-that will be made to suffer if no one steps up and forces a full and independent review of what EDC is trying to pull. Yet, as we have seen, the area elected officials-with the exception of Senator Avella and CM Halloran-have remained timidly on the sidelines.

This is not an example of righteous representation. You don't have to be an opponent of the project to want to insure proper oversights and control over the development agency-not when we have seen how certain mayoral agencies have screwed up managerial projects such as CityTime and cost tax payers millions as a result.

So, does anyone want to simply take what EDC at face value that this first phase will not need ramps? To get a better picture of what the potential traffic impacts will be, we once again rely on Brian Ketcham's analysis-data that will be the foundation of the lawsuit brought by WPU against the city's illegal segmentation of the Willets Point project.

As Ketcham points out, "The proposed Phase One Willets Point project totals 1.35 million square feet and includes a 650,000 square foot big box retail center generating 84% of all vehicle trips. NYCEDC has proposed this scaled down project in order to avoid dealing with ramps connecting with the Van Wyck Expressway at the northeast end of the Iron Triangle—ramps they are having a hard time getting approved."

Attention Wal-Mart shoppers! This is still one humongous development-and it will be anchored by box stores! Yet the city council doesn't want to exercise the oversight over this? And, as Ketcham highlights, EDC is up to its old tricks-rooking the guests and cooking the books. How so? Under counting, and false baseline analyses.

As Ketcham tells us:

"EDC claims this Phase One project will have a lower traffic impact than earlier proposed for this development. They make this claim based on estimates for traffic impacts based on under reporting trip generation rates.

EDC assumes few people will drive to the site but will walk or use transit to shop. Willets Point is remote from transit and is more than a mile from downtown Flushing, the closest population center.

They assume trip generation rates that produce relative few auto trips—rates that are below accepted standards and lower still than used at nearby Flushing Commons and the Gateway Center in East New York.

They assume vehicle occupancy that is higher than assumed for either of these other projects that cuts traffic volume by a third."

Same old EDC it seems. But what happens when we adjust for a more accurate baseline analysis? Well, the number of trips simply jumps: "EDC reports the project will generate about 1,400 car and truck trips for weekday PM peak hours. Adjusting for auto use and trip generation rates will double this number to 2,800 trips. Adjusting for vehicle occupancy will increase the number of trips to nearly 4,000 trips in the PM peak hour.EDC has shaved the numbers used in estimating project impacts to minimize project traffic and thereby eliminate the need for Van Wyck ramps."

Would anybody buy a used car from these people? But the part we really like is the assumption-the last refuse of traffic scoundrels-that masses of folks will be using the train and buses. Unbelievable-and simply more evidence that the good citizens from Bay Terrace, Mitchel-Linden, Bowne Civic, Malba Gardens, Juniper Civic and Comet were right to join with WPU and the Natural Resources Defense Council to call for an independent review of all the traffic assumptions in this project.

But Ketcham isn't finished-and his coup de grace is in his comparison of this phased development with Gateway Mall in East New York: "EDC is proposing 910 parking spaces to service a 650,000 square foot big box retail complex. Gateway Center in East New York provides nearly 3,000 spaces for the same size retail center."

Con man Robert Preston in the Music Man couldn't do a better job than EDC in trying to beguile the people with false promises. Yet in spite of all of its attempts at minimization, EDC can't diminish the fact that this large partial development will have a massive and unmitigatable impact that necessitates those ramps:

"In spite of all the data manipulation EDC reports severe gridlock conditions at the two entry portals to this project: 126th Street at 34th Avenue and 126th Street and Roosevelt Avenue. Technical Memorandum 004, provided by EDC on March 14th, four days before the deadline for submitting comments on this proposal itself reveals that with Phase One traffic volumes overall LOS for 126th Street/GCP Ramp at 34th Avenue with Phase One traffic are a severe F with average vehicle delay of 422 seconds (7 minutes) with 4 of 5 approaches LOS F with delays of 7.7 to 13.5 minutes, sufficient to completely block access to the project site. These conditions will be much worse once reasonable adjustments are made for trip generation characteristics that could double or even triple project traffic impacts."

So, EDC has under reported project traffic impacts, has failed to investigate how traffic will move into and out of the proposed Phase One project including how shoppers might access off-street parking, is proposing far less parking for a 1.35 million square foot multi-use project than is standard practice, claims the project will have a low traffic impact and buries the truth in their Technical Memorandum 004 that reports severe gridlock conditions at critical portals that will prevent access to the site for most of the day.

It is clear from this brief summary that EDC must provide more access to the Phase One project and the Van Wyck ramps must be one of these access points. Of course, what the resultant impact would be on the Van Wyck is an entirely different story-one that EDC can't continue to dodge forever.

Statement by traffic engineer Brian Ketcham

"Nearly four decades ago William Hoppen and I took on the West Side Highway project. We did so alone. And we paid for all of our work in cash and in careers. The City, State and Federal governments spent $150 million to stop us. They could not. Although they did torture us afterwards.

Westway was not nearly so complicated as Willets Point. Nor as divisive! As with Willets Point, Westway was a multi-billion project. A huge land development swindle that would have made the City’s favored developers billions. Another similarity is that the Westway engineers, Parsons Brinckerhoff, were the same folks who were to form AKRF, the environmental engineering firm who botched the Willets Point environmental impact statement and have caused the multi-year delay in this project.

These engineering firms along with NYCEDC will ultimately be responsible for the collapse of the Willets Point project. In the case of Westway these environmental engineers could not make the case in support for Westway. Their efforts cost taxpayers $150,000,000 and they did not have a clue. It is incredible to think about that battle nearly 40 years later.

For Willets Point, the problem is that AKRF knows precisely what they are doing and they have to lie to make their case. They know that Willets Point is too big for the Flushing area. They know the surrounding roadway network cannot accommodate Willets Point traffic. They know that the Van Wyck Expressway and connecting expressways cannot accommodate so much additional traffic. They know there is no additional transit capacity to accommodate Willets Point and the other projects like Flushing Commons and that even more traffic will be forced onto the area than reported.

They lied and they got caught. They have lied repeatedly. Over the last 18 months we have provided NYCEDC, NYSDOT and the FHWA dozens of documents supporting these assertions, identifying the errors, omissions and outright lies that forced EDC in 2010 to withdraw its application for ramps connecting Willets Point to the Van Wyck Expressway.

While these agencies have failed to directly acknowledge these reports they have been forced, based on these documents, to delay any action on the Willets Point project. Within the next month I will be providing you with a new report summarizing the situation today, critiquing the latest efforts by EDC to sell their Willets Point project, and connecting the current problems that we have identified with all of the many reports that we have submitted over the past 18 months.

The ramps will not help reduce the impact of the Willets Point project. The surrounding roads and expressways cannot accommodate this project let alone the other 20 million square feet of new development generating more than 170,000 new car and truck trips daily. The existing transit systems cannot accommodate 200,000 more daily trips leaving most of these travelers to use their cars and add to the areas Super-Gridlock conditions.

The NYCEDC cannot meet any of the eight FHWA criteria for ramp approval and, as NYCEDC has said repeatedly, the Willets Point project will not work without the ramps. The Willets Point Development Plan is fatally flawed and must be abandoned."

EDC trying to have it both ways

Reblogged from Neighborhood Retail Alliance:

Crain's Insider-in response to our rebuttal of its original post on the long delayed Willets Point/Van Wyck ramp report-now comes forth, courtesy of the serial prevaricators at EDC, with the following explanation for the egregious failure of the agency to follow the Freedom of Information Law: "Willets Point opponents, whose repeated Freedom of Information Law requests for the city's assessment of traffic impacts have been denied and called premature, were shocked to read in the Insider that the assessment is under review by state and federal agencies. A city spokesman says it is just a draft and therefore not public yet."

Hold on for just one minute. The purpose of WPU filing a FOIL request for the revised AMR was precisely so it could review the document before it was publicly released-as it did with the original flawed, and possibly fraudulent, ramp report. It was as a result of that successful FOIL request that we were able to flag the phony data submissions from the EDC consultants that led to the report's rightful demise.

Having lost its appeal of the original AMR FOIL, EDC and NYSDOT simply have no legal right to withhold the revision-and they know it. So, we are left with the simple explanation that there are ample reasons-none that comport with good public policy or the public interest-for the stonewalling. Chief among them is the fear of premature exposure of the agency's continual malfeasance in regard to this matter. What EDC wants to do is to truncate the review process and bum rush another flawed AMR through the state and federal oversight authorities without giving critics-and the impacted communities-adequate time to evaluate the revised ramp report.

All of which dramatizes the need for NYS DOT to initiate an independent evaluation of the feasibility of building Willets Point ramps-as NRDC, the Sierra Club, and eight community groups have asked for. It is our view, bolstered by the work of ace traffic consultant Brian Ketcham, that there is simply no way for these two proposed ramps to accommodate the 80,000 daily car and truck trips that the Willets Point project will generate-not to mention the millions of more feet of development going on in and around the Willets Point area.

EDC's secrecy, delay, and conscious withholding of data in violation of the law, makes abundantly clear that our suspicions are correct-and that this review process needs to be forcefully wrested from EDC's cold dead hands.

The great city-state coverup

From the Neighborhood Retail Alliance:

It has been seven months since Willets Point United, and its traffic consultant Brian Ketcham, demonstrated the blatant deficiency of a Van Wyck ramp report submitted by NYC EDC to the NYSDOT. The state agency is responsible for initially approving these ramps-or not-with the Federal Highway Administration having the last word on their feasibility. So the question that we ask, is there a cover up at NYSDOT?

In this interim seven month period, EDC and its consultants, in apparent secrecy and collusion with the oversight agency, have been working feverishly-to address the gross defects of their original submission (a revised ramp report was first slated to be ready in March). But, the WPU and Ketcham, after having been the key actors in insuring that the original report was sent back for revision, (in spite of promises from NYSDOT that they would be included in the revision process) have been left out; leaving EDC's original axe to grind consultant as the sole interlocutor with the state on the ramps feasibility.

As a result of the agency's reneging on an open, professional review process, WPU has been forced to file numerous Freedom of Information requests just to obtain information that, if transparency was valued, would be shared collegially in the interest of insuring that the impact of the ramps on the entire Queens highway grid system would be honestly evaluated. Instead the EDC consultant, AKRF, whose work was not only deficient but, arguably deceptive, has been allowed to act as the sole provider of technical knowledge to the agency.

The compelling question is, why has NYSDOT circled the wagons and resisted the free and open exchange of information? This is the question that WPU's Ketcham has asked DOT Commissioner Stanley Gee in a letter to the agency head. In particular, Ketcham raises the issue of NYSDOT's accountability to the public: "Given your distinguished career at the Federal Highway Administration and more recently at New York State Department of Transportation, I am bringing to your attention current Departmental practices that undermine your objective of improving its performance, accountability and communication within and outside the agency."

DOT responds to NRDC letter

From the Neighborhood Retail Alliance:

NYSDOT has finally responded to the NRDC request in a letter dated July, 2, 2010-but is claiming that there is no need for an independent review: "The NEPA documents that are being developed are an Environmental Assessment and a revised Access Modification Report....We understand the request for an independent review but believe that working closely with NYCEDC, we can assure that the data will be based on sound data."

This is, without a doubt, a simply breathtaking assertion in the light of the contradictory and fallacious submissions from the very development corp that is now been made a valued collaborator with the state agency empowered to render fair and accurate judgments in these kinds of matters. It is, at the same time, inexplicable in the light of the Ketcham findings that the Van Wyck Expressway cannot accommodate even a tiny fraction of Willets Point traffic. The only way to do so would be to widen the expressway to four lanes in each direction for several miles. NYSDOT simply does not have the money to do this and the cost of widening the elevated structures would total a billion of dollars or more, another subsidy to developers when critical transportation projects all over New York State are being shelved.

All of this implies a gross negligence by NYSDOT of its statutory oversight responsibility-and indicates that the agency, instead of clearing the air-as NRDC suggests-through an independent review, is actively colluding in a bag job; as its resistance to WPU's freedom of information requests dramatizes quite well. The question now is where does the FHWA stand? Will they really rubber stamp this buffoonery or will they step up and kill what has already been demonstrated as an abject failure?

It all comes down to the ramps...

From the Queens Courier:

At issue is whether the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and State Department of Transportation (DOT) will approve two new highway ramps on the Van Wyck Expressway in order to help alleviate some of the additional traffic that is expected in the area. So, it’s not surprising that advocates from each side have very different views on the issue.

“We think that the highways cannot physically handle the massive amount of traffic that the Willets Point project would dump on it,” said Michael Gerrard, a lawyer representing WPU. “Merely adding ramps doesn’t increase the mainline capacity of the Van Wyck that will remain a chokepoint.”

Dave Lombino, a spokesperson for the city’s Economic Development Corporation (EDC), which is the lead agency working on the Willets Point project, said that the approval for the ramps is all part of the redevelopment process and that lobbyists for the WPU are trying to create a false impression of uncertainty around a critical project that will generate thousands of jobs and economic development for the city.

“But we’re hopeful there will not be any significant delay in the approvals, and we’re confident we will remain on target to complete the project on the timetable we’ve set forth,” Lombino said.

In February, the city submitted its preliminary draft environmental assessment to representatives from the two agencies, and Brian Ketcham, a traffic engineer hired by the WPU, said the report was fraught with errors. He believes that EDC is under-estimating the additional traffic that will result from the development of Willets Point and the nearby Flushing Commons development at downtown Municipal Lot 1.

Ketcham said that the Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) for both projects conceded that in 2017 there would be gridlock traffic conditions on the highway, but the initial AMR projections for 2035 showed significantly less traffic.

“I cannot imagine what goes through the minds of EDC when they have two projects that are reporting gridlock conditions, and then they turn around and they say there will be free-flowing traffic,” Ketcham said.

Jake Bono, a third generation owner of Bono Sawdust that has called Willets Point home for nearly 80 years, said that the city’s initial presentation to the FHWA and DOT was not surprising because they have been employing the same tactics from the beginning.

“They are committed to doing whatever it takes to get the project done. If it’s illegal, if it’s immoral, it doesn’t matter,” Bono said. “At the end of the day they can never produce a report that will work.”

Flushing Times editorial far from accurate

From the Neighborhood Retail Alliance:

The Flushing Times, setting a new standard for diminished intellectual capacity, unleashed an attack against us in last week's issue for trying to create an unneeded and undesirable delay in the development of Willets Point-and in the process so totally confused the paper's good readers about the facts at hand that it would be accurate to assume that the obfuscation was purposeful.

In the first place, it should be pointed out to the paper's readers, that none of the businesses at Willets Point have been relocated-and precious few have even been paid for their property, as the city has withheld payments in these troubled economic times. And we're a bit confused about the nature of the, "losing battle," since no negative outcome has occurred since we were retained last year.

Now we'll speak slowly here, and repeat what we had said-and what the Flushing Times had actually reported: "The issue, as always is the discrepancies between the original EIS and the ramp report submitted by EDC to the state: 'The group’s traffic concerns center around two ramps to the Van Wyck Expressway, which would be built in order to accommodate traffic to and from the new development.Lipsky argues that a traffic study the group commissioned found the project would lead to 80,000 new car trips per day and slow everyday traffic to a crawl on major surrounding roads, such as the Grand Central and Cross Island parkways and Northern and College Point boulevards.'"

The Flushing Times owes its readers an apology for this misdirection. As we said at Bay Terrace-and will repeat to all of the civic groups on our upcoming Willets Point Victory Tour-the Willets Point project will create gridlock throughout the borough's arterial infrastructure-a reality that can be gleaned from the city's own traffic study that the paper falsely claims we are challenging. It is this set of facts that have been corrupted by a new team of consultants that have apparently been brought in to confuse regulators at NYSDOT and FHWA about the realities expressed in the original EIS.

But the most egregious aspect of the Flushing Times' ad hominem attack, is that it muddies the waters about what the city is trying to do-and how the Willets Point development will gridlock much of Queens. Better to go after the lobbyist messenger with the bad news than to honestly confront the real dangers that lie ahead for so many Queens communities should this project go forward.

State kicks traffic report back to EDC

From the Daily News:

A group of Willets Point business owners fired another shot last week at the $3 billion plan to redevelop the Iron Triangle, but city officials don't expect to fall behind schedule.

The business owners - facing potential eviction when construction begins - charged that the traffic report from the city's Economic Development Corp. is flawed and is reason enough to bring the megadevelopment plan to a halt.

A traffic engineer hired by Willets Point United argued that the city misrepresented congestion on the Van Wyck Expressway created by other nearby projects in its proposal to build on-ramps and off-ramps near the gritty industrial area in the vicinity of Citi Field.

"There does not seem to be any area-wide planning going on for this community," said engineer Brian Ketcham. "They haven't done their analysis correctly."

The EDC's Access Modification Report, which outlines potential congestion on the Van Wyck, did not properly account for the added traffic from other developments, such as Flushing Commons and Sky View Parc, Ketcham said.

"They're trying to whitewash the impact of these projects," he said.

The state Department of Transportation kicked the report back to the EDC a few weeks ago, but agency officials said they are confident it will pass soon.

Richard Lipsky explains what is really going on here and here.

Brian Ketcham's Testimony at the Queens CB7 Public Hearing On the Flushing Commons DEIS

My name is Brian Ketcham. I am a traffic engineer. I have been working for Willets Point United, assisting them in understanding the full impacts of the Willets Point Development Plan. I am testifying on behalf of Willets Point United.

As I have reviewed the thousands of pages of technical materials for the Willets Point project I have found serious problems with that project that relate to the Flushing Commons; Problems that underscore the traffic problems that your community will suffer from new planned development.

You have already approved the Willets Point project, 9 million square feet of residential and commercial development that will produce 80,000 car and truck trips daily, 365 days a year. The Final Generic Environmental Impact Statement (FGEIS) reports that Willets Point traffic will gridlock your community morning, noon and night. And that is without accounting for projects like the nearby Sky View Parc nearing completion, a project that will add a thousand more trips in the PM peak hour, or what happens during Mets games and/or tennis matches.

What I have found in my review for Willets Point United is that the FGEIS for Willets Point failed to fully account for Sky View Parc and ignored the effects of Flushing Commons. In fact, there is little evidence that the FGEIS accounted for many of the 90 new developments surrounding the Willets Point Iron Triangle. You folks approved a project--Willets Point--that vastly understated its traffic impacts and still reported gridlocked traffic conditions. Clearly, adding another 800 to 1,000 car and truck trips from Flushing Commons in the PM peak hour to an already gridlocked Main Street will simply make life for you folks that much worse.

For Willets Point to work NYCEDC is convinced they need direct access to the Van Wyck Expressway. To get the ramps EDC must convince the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) that the ramps will improve traffic conditions along the Van Wyck Expressway. To do that EDC has prepared an Access Modification Report or AMR. In doing so the EDC has cut the use of the ramps from 47% in the PM peak hour to 16%, leaving 1,900 PM peak hour auto trips to find other ways to get into or out of the Iron Triangle. Some of this added traffic will move through Downtown Flushing. None of this is accounted for in the Willets Point analyses or in the Flushing Commons DEIS. As bad as conditions are described in both the Willets Point FGEIS and in the Flushing Commons DEIS it will be much worse once these projects are completed.

The following summarizes just some of the issues that I have identified as I have reviewed the Draft Environmental Impact Statement for Flushing Commons.

The Flushing Commons provides for 1,600 parking spaces in the project, 600 of which are assumed to be required by the project itself. The rest will be available to long term parkers at much greater cost than motorists currently pay. The developer assumes that approximately 70% of residents will own a car whereas 90% of residents in Queens own a car. The DEIS underreports auto use; Correcting for auto ownership alone would require nearly 30% more parking for residents.

Even with this adjustment a great many motorists currently parking at Municipal Lot No. 1 would be displaced by Flushing Commons to more remote commuter parking in Willets Point. There is no evidence that this displacement has been accounted for in the Flushing Commons traffic analysis. I can assure you it has not been accounted for in the Willets Point traffic analyses.

The developer assumes that less than 30% of all resident trips are made by auto for any purpose. Travel behavior in Queens is very different from that assumed in the Flushing Commons DEIS—most of which is lifted from the Willets Point FGEIS. Compared to the 30% assumption for auto use, 53% of Queens’s trips are made by auto.

The DEIS also assumes 46% of residents will use transit (Willets Point assumes 55%). Queens’ residents use transit for just 23% of travel. See attached Table. Auto use by Flushing Commons' residents is very likely substantially greater than what has been assumed. Correcting for this error will result in a near doubling of resident auto trips with a huge impact on congestion in your community.

The proportion of auto trips made by all land uses in Flushing Commons does not change by time of day. This is simply wrong. Trip purpose and volume does vary by time of day. Reference NYMTC’s “Household Interview Survey” for evidence of this behavior.

The developer has already reported to CB7 that congestion levels with the project will be severe in Downtown Flushing and that the traffic problems caused by the project cannot be mitigated. The DEIS reports huge impact at Downtown Flushing intersections such as at Northern Blvd. and Main Street where northbound left turn vehicle delay is increased from 7 minutes to 14 minutes or at Roosevelt Avenue and Union Street where the southbound right turn delay increases from 6 minutes to 18 minutes—I emphasize minutes of delay not seconds meaning severe gridlocked conditions.

Congestion levels in and around Downtown Flushing will be even worse than has been reported by the developer. First, because auto trip generation and temporal distributions for the project are wrong; Correcting for these errors will add significantly to congestion levels.

Plus, Flushing Commons has accounted for only a tiny fraction of the traffic generated by the Willets Point Development Plan.

Like Willets Point, Flushing Commons has low balled auto ownership, failed to provide sufficient resident parking and assumed very low usage of autos for trips. These assumptions are wrong and are contradicted by various sources. Correcting for these errors will add greatly to Flushing Commons’ No Build traffic volume in Downtown Flushing and therefore increase the severity of project impacts.

In addition, the Willets Point plan assumes about half the traffic produced by that project will use the proposed Van Wyck ramps. I have to emphasize that NYCEDC has recently cut this assumption to 16% of Willets Point traffic using the Van Wyck ramps leaving nearly 1,900 auto trips unaccounted for in the PM peak hour.

I have modeled the proposed ramps and demonstrated that the Van Wyck Expressway cannot accommodate even 16% of Willets Point traffic. Adding more traffic to the Van Wyck Expressway severely reduces travel speeds. The ramps will not work as hoped for.

The bottom line is that Flushing Commons has not accounted for Willets Point traffic and has under estimated the number of auto trips Flushing Commons will produce during peak commuter hours. Congestion levels reported in the DEIS will therefore be much more severe than the gridlocked conditions already reported by the developer.

I have not estimated the externality costs for Flushing Commons, but the costs of added traffic congestion, the addition of 1,000 more traffic accidents and the health and environmental damages from the full build out of the Willets Point Development Plan comes to more than $150 million annually, or about four times the benefits claimed for that project.

I suggest that CB7 undertake similar analyses for Flushing Commons to see if there is any economic benefit from this project. I also recommend that you get NYCDOT to undertake traffic simulation modeling so that you finally understand how your community processes traffic and how you can improve traffic flow.

Finally, you really need a wholesale revision for the DEIS that corrects for the many errors that I have identified before any action is taken by CB7 on this project.

In the absence of any revised and corrected DEIS, Community Board 7 lacks the necessary information on which to base any approval of the Flushing Commons Project, and in that case must reject the application.

Brian T. Ketcham, P.E.
BRIAN KETCHAM ENGINEERING, P.C.
175 Pacific Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201
March 22, 2010

Could the FHWA be going our way?

From the Neighborhood Retail Alliance:

The team from Willets Point United met with the Federal Highway Administration in order to brief the agency about the complexity of the traffic impacts generated by the development at the site of the Iron Triangle-and the ramps that are supposed to mitigate said traffic. The FHWA, along with NYSDOT, need to approve these ramps if the the Willets Point project is to be able to go forward.

Now it is our contention that the entire review process should be subject to an independent evaluation under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). Our rationale derives from the faulty and self serving traffic data submissions from the Economic Development Corporation and its hired guns from URS-something that we have already pointed out here, and here. EDC and its minions have proven to be-either through mendacity or inadequacy-simply not up to the task of providing quality data.

Now the glaring nature of this insufficiency is underscored by the discrepancies between the original EIS done for the ULURP application; and the subsequent report done exclusively for the ramp approval process (called an AMR report). Here's how consultant Brian Ketcham summarizes these inadequacies:

"1. Too many discrepancies between AMR and FGEIS for the AMR to be reliable assessment of ramps.

2. FGEIS reports severe traffic impacts even w/ramps; the AMR reports no problems.

3. Field observation confirms the FGEIS.

4. AMR greatly misrepresents future traffic growth.

5. AMR does not account for all Willets Point trips.

6. AMR shows that ramps make no difference.

7.Modeling shows the ramps are counter-productive for highway system, violating FHWA key criteria.

In the face of all of this, what choice is there? NYSDOT must disapprove the AMR."

These problems are also fatal when you examine what the federal highway guidelines are for the approval of ramps-as item 7 above highlights. Ketcham's work for WPU-and remember that Brian, as well as WPU attorney Mike Gerrard, were the young turks who brought down Westway-was damning enough to prompt the NYSDOT to spit back the first AMR to EDC for serious revision.

In fact, the glaring, and problematic nature of the city's work product, has prompted the following from the National Resources Defense Council-in a letter to NYSDOT and the FHWA "NRDC is not taking a position on advancing the Willets Point project or on constructing the ramps. But based on our preliminary review, we are concerned over the discrepancies in the study results, and also by the prospect that a project could impair regional mobility by disrupting a key highway like the Van Wyck."

And NRDC goes on to say that because of these discrepancies, "...we believe that the best course of action is for the FHWA and NYS DOT to undertake a full NEPA review of the access ramps and their impacts on traffic-including the Van Wyck-without undue reliance on the analysis performed by the City, the project's proponents."

Nothing less should be required here, because as we have seen with Columbia, there is alot of incestuous activity going on between the City and its hired guns-and the first victim in all of this is the truth. But the good news emanating from today's meeting is that the folks at FHWA believe that our (really Brian's) critique has serious merit-and it will be undertaking a comprehensive environmental assessment to determine what the appropriate course of action should be in the case of these ramps-taking the process out of the hands of biased, parochial interests.

The next step for WPU is to bring the message to the Queens civic groups so that they can see for themselves the traffic nightmare in their future if this Willets Point project is allowed to go forward. In the process, the self serving dealings of the city's lead economic development agency will be thoroughly hung out to dry for everyone to plainly see-from illegal lobbying and false city council testimony, to cooked traffic books; sunlight will be the best disinfectant.

Ketcham: City's Willets Point EIS and ramp study don't jibe

From Crains:

The traffic engineer who helped kill Westway, the massive West Side highway project proposed during the Koch administration, now has his sights set on derailing the city’s redevelopment of Willets Point.

Local property owners fighting the project are banking on traffic engineer Brian Ketcham’s study that shows two proposed ramps would increase traffic on the Van Wyck Expressway and have made it a key element of their lawsuit challenging the project’s environmental impact statement.

The Bloomberg administration has argued that the ramps are necessary to prevent a traffic nightmare at the site.

The original environmental impact statement, or EIS, showed the massive Willets Point project would generate heavy traffic, but a recent report on the proposed ramps showed a much sunnier picture. The ramp study—an “access modification report,” or AMR, which is technical documentation to support federal and state decisions on whether to approve the ramps—is being redone after Mr. Ketcham used traffic data from the environmental impact statement to demonstrate that the ramps would make a bad situation worse. The entire redevelopment, with 9 million buildable square feet, is projected to generate 80,000 vehicle trips daily.

“Our problem is that [the ramp study] is so incredibly different from the environmental impact statement,” Mr. Ketcham wrote in an e-mail message. “The EIS reports Willets Point will create gridlock throughout community; AMR reports free-flow traffic. An incredible contrast.”

The access modification report was submitted last summer; Mr. Ketcham noted his objections in a letter last month.

Mr. Ketcham is being paid by project opponents, but his assessment that the access modification report underestimates the traffic impact stems from common modeling software that the state Department of Transportation trusts. The opponents see the department as a potential ally because the agency cannot afford to build all the new road capacity demanded of it.

The ramps require state and federal approval, and it is possible that without the ramps, the project would not proceed. Project opponents are meeting Thursday with the Federal Highway Administration and will ask for an independent review of the ramp report that is now being revised by a private consultant on behalf of the Bloomberg administration.

“We will be submitting a revised draft in the upcoming weeks that is responsive to the comments and issues raised by state DOT and the Federal Highway Administration, as well as those from Willets Point opponents,” said David Lombino, a spokesman for the Bloomberg administration’s Economic Development Corp., the lead agency on Willets Point.

“At the very least, we have put this off by six months,” claimed Richard Lipsky, the lobbyist for the property owners’ group Willets Point United.

"Build these ramps, and Willets Point, Corona and Flushing will get screwed."

"Build these ramps, and Willets Point, Corona and Flushing will get screwed. And, as our modeling shows, so will every motorist traveling through north central Queens." -- Brian Ketcham, Traffic Engineer

On January 27, 2010, WPU members testified in opposition to federal recertification of the New York Metropolitan Transportation Council (NYMTC).

NYMTC recently amended the Transportation Improvement Program (TIP), to include the proposed construction of two new controversial Van Wyck Expressway access ramps. According to the City's own study, these proposed ramps will inflict severe adverse traffic impacts upon popular Queens roadways, and upon residents and commuters who rely on those roadways. WPU believes that NYMTC's amendment of the TIP to include the proposed Van Wyck ramps is an abdication of NYMTC's responsibility to ensure that transportation projects conform to accepted standards and do not harm the communities where they occur.

The New York State Department of Transportation now is considering whether or not to approve the proposed Van Wyck ramps, based upon a deficient report submitted by the New York City Economic Development Corporation which blatantly low-balls the traffic impacts, and contradicts the findings of the Environmental Impact Statement.

For in-depth information pertaining to the proposed Van Wyck access ramps, their severe adverse traffic impacts, and what you can do now to prevent their construction, visit: www.trafficnightmare.org.

Richard Lipsky:
"... the review of the ramp approval has been tainted ..."



Brian Ketcham:
"Build these ramps, and Willets Point, Corona and Flushing will get screwed."



Irene Presti:
"... a very serious error that harms the people of Queens ..."



Joseph Ardizzone:
"It's nothing but traffic gridlock."



Chris Petrizzo:
"... it's been negligently approved ..."

WPU's traffic expert to meet with DOT

From the Neighborhood Retail Alliance:

Representatives of Willets Point United-joined by traffic expert Brian Ketcham-will be meeting with the regional staff of NYSDOT today to discuss just why the group believes that the agency shouldn't approve the city's (actually EDC's) application to build ramps off of the Van Wyck Expressway. This should be quite an interesting get together.

Initially, NYSDOT had cancelled the originally scheduled meeting when it found out that representatives of state elected officials planned to attend in order to learn more about why WPU felt that the ramps were not feasible. The implication for the cancellation was that the meeting was becoming, "too political."

This is a situation that genuinely puzzled us. In close to thirty years of lobbying city and state agencies, we have never seen such skittishness about who's coming to a meeting-and the need to micromanage who should or shouldn't be there. Subsequent to the original cancellation, NYSDOT has tried to further restrict attendance-claiming that we shouldn't be there because the meeting is purely, "technical." Yet EDC, the lead political agency for the development, will be represented.

So what's motivating this need to restrict? In our view, it appears that EDC is playing an overbearing role-and if what we suspect is true, than the above board nature of the approval process is thrown into doubt. Now we know that NYSDOT doesn't have the in-house capacity to evaluate the work of URS, EDC's traffic consultants. And in the absence of that capacity, the agency is normally inclined to (relatively) uncritically accept the proffered work.

WPU has thrown the proverbial monkey wrench into the normal review process by submitting-with today's power point presentation by forty year veteran Ketcham-a detailed rebuttal to the URS assertions. And the flawed nature of the submission will be revealed in an extremely harsh light. Put simply, the traffic ramp report (AMR) so thoroughly contradicts the original traffic study done for the ULURP EIS, that the good intentions of EDC must be called into question.

Derailing the Collusion Express

Courtesy of Neighborhood Retail Alliance:

In the run up to the city council land use vote on Willets Point one thing is crystal clear: no one bothered to even read the fictional narrative prepared by AKRF in lieu of an actual environmental review. If they had, a great deal of negotiated modification would have occurred-spurred by local council members concerned about just how to mitigate the 80,000 cars a day that the project will generate (and that's according to the low ball figures provided by the city's favorite consulting lap dog).

And in addition, there might have been more safeguards negotiated to insure that the final environmental review for the one actual mitigating factor-proposed ramps off of the Van Wyck-was done by an independent team of consultants, with a proviso that the entire review process be re-submitted to the council for approval. All of this might have happened if there was any genuine concern for environmental impacts at either the city council or the city planning commission.

The reality is, however, that the entire ULURP process has degenerated into a Kabuki theater performance-with the AKRF's and URS's of the world getting paid huge coin for an expensive pantomime act that is never really examined by any of the decision makers in the legislative play acting. In fact, as we told our consultant Ketcham-a true Diogenes in a world of liars for hire-the only time these traffic studies actually get read is when the Alliance hires him to review them.

So, while a reform of the ULURP fraud is way over due, we come back to the sleight-of-hand exercise on the Willets Point traffic stop. The original EIS-and its accompanying traffic study-was handled by the folks at AKRF, the same candid cameras who gave us the duel representation effort on the Columbia expansion scheme; representing the city for a blight study, and Columbia for the environmental review.

Now AKRF doesn't do the traffic work-and in the case of Willets Point the work was farmed out to an outfit called Eng-Wong Taub. Still, as we pointed out, E-WT's analysis, although alarming and severe, was still de minimis, underestimating just what the overall traffic volume would do to the contiguous communities. But what is truly alarming, is that the second subcontractor for the AMR (ramps) report-URS-has managed to submit traffic data that totally contradicts what is contained in the original traffic study done under ULURP for the original zoning application.

As Brian Ketcham's letter has told NYSDOT-the review agency for the ramps-the AMR report fails to account for the original documentation provided the city under CEQR: "However, I will show you that the draft AMR does not appear to fully account for the Willets Point Development Plan and other approved development in close proximity to the ramps that will generate approximately 100,000 trips per day in 2017 (including 80,000 from the Willets Point project) and will continue to do so in 2035."

Which means that AKRF-yes, once again-as the general contractor for both the FGEIS and the AMR report (or at least the consultant that was most familiar with both documents) has managed to keep quiet about what it should know intimately: that the two reports are contradictory, with the AMR document a clear attempt to both minimize and mislead the NYSDOT and the FHWA authority so that the ramps can be approved-even though they will apparently do little to mitigate the severe traffic impacts that the Willets Point development will foist on its neighboring communities.

All of which should provide ample fodder for a State Senate Transportation Committee hearing-and the fact that Senator Perkins, the official who has led the fight against agency/consultant collusion, also sits on the committee is fortuitous for those who want to put an end to fixed development games sponsored by quasi-independent state or city agencies. In the case of Willets Point, sunlight will be the best disinfectant.

Traffic is Quinn's issue with Armory project - why not with Willets Point?

From Neighborhood Retail Alliance:

"Almost lost in the euphoria over the defeat of the Kingsbridge Armory project was the crucial role played by Brian Ketcham's masterful traffic analysis-because ultimately it is traffic and socio-economic impacts that must be the determining factor in any land use decision.

This was brought home by the comments of Speaker Quinn relayed in a live blog by the Bronx News Network: "12:35 Quinn is talking now. Says they're disappointed they couldn't come to an agreement with the administration. Urging all colleagues to vote to disapprove the proposal today."After numerous and lengthy discussions, there's a significant public health and traffic impact. We cannot approve a project that brings more people to an already crowded area. .. without a true plan to deal with that traffic congestion."Other issues important and significant but not part of vote today, she said: Current plan is simply not the right proposal for the residents of this community at this time." Praises Annabel Palma, Bx delegation leader, and her Bronx colleagues."

The reality here is, that the amount of traffic that this project would generate-once again contradicting the Kermit the Mayor image of the city's richest man-would have been a real hardship on the Kingsbridge Heights neighborhood. And the inadequacies of the Related traffic study should initiate a call for ULURP reform so that the traffic analysis is taken out of the hands of developer puppets claiming independent expertise.

So hats off to Ketcham-and a cautionary tale for EDC in its effort to cover up just how inadequate the Willets Point traffic study really is. If the mayor is gonna be going green, than he needs to become more honest-and insure that his policies reflect the high minded rhetoric that he graces world gatherings with."

Christine Quinn ordered the City Council to vote yes on the Willets Point project despite the immitigable traffic impacts that even the City admits will result from the development and the construction of ramps for the Van Wyck Expressway.

Why the double standard, Chris?