![\"traffic](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/DSCF1919-scaled.jpg\" "\\"Adams")
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Cars and trucks travel down the BQE in Brooklyn Heights. <\/p>\n
File Photo by Kevin Duggan<\/p>\n
Mayor Eric Adams<\/a> is urging the federal government to\u00a0expedite the long-delayed\u00a0Brooklyn-Queens Expressway<\/a> overhaul, warning that without immediate action, the city may be forced to impose truck weight restrictions and face massive\u00a0traffic disruptions.<\/p>\n In an Oct. 15 letter to U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, Adams asked the feds to publish a Notice of Intent by Nov. 14 to begin the federal environmental review for the deteriorating 1.5-mile stretch of the BQE between Atlantic Avenue and Sands Street<\/a>.<\/p>\n The mayor called the aging triple-cantilever \u201ca backbone of the regional and national economy\u201d and said further delay \u201crisks consequences to public safety and the regional supply chain.\u201d\n<\/p>\n The letter marks a late-term push by Adams to advance the project before leaving office in January. He cautioned that if the city cannot move forward soon, structural issues may force \u201csignificant weight restrictions in the short term and permanent closure in the medium term,\u201d diverting heavy traffic onto local streets and causing \u201cbillions of dollars in economic losses.\u201d<\/p>\n BQE vision \u2018very murky,\u2019 Brooklyn groups say<\/p>\n Local environmental and neighborhood organizations, which have been advocating against the city\u2019s plans to overhaul and \u201cpotentially expand\u201d the aging BQE, said they were blindsided by the mayor\u2019s move to push forward.<\/p>\n The groups have yet to receive a substantial response to their May 28 letter<\/a> to Gov. Kathy Hochul, Adams, and state and city transportation leaders, urging them to abandon the NYC Department of Transportation\u2019s design plans that would rebuild the heavily used thoroughfare before the official environmental review begins.<\/p>\n \u201cOne of the things that\u2019s still unclear to me, and I think unclear to many in the community, is what exactly is going into this environmental review that they hope to start,\u201d said Lara Birnback, executive director of the Brooklyn Heights Association, in an interview with amNewYork.<\/p>\n \u201cSo not only are we not really in favor of beginning an environmental review now, we as a community don\u2019t have a clear understanding of what exactly is being studied, what their plans are? What do they want to see happen? It\u2019s very murky.\u201d<\/p>\n