6/23/22 Red Hook last mile, ecommerce meeting
/During the pandemic, a huge surge in building last mile, ecommerce facilities occured in our neighborhood of Red Hook and just across the Gowanus Bay in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. This is part of a citywide and national pattern.
Thursday, 6/23/22, 5-7pm, a meeting on last mile, ecommerce facilities in Red Hook was hosted by our Councilmember Alexa Aviles and Brooklyn Community Board 6 (CB6). See CB6 last mile resource page here.
There was no offical virtual component planned, so PortSide was asked to livestream this by community members behind RHAFTS (Red Hook Advocates For Traffic Solutions). We streamed it and share our Zoom video and chat below, along with the video recording by Red Hook resident Mike McCabe of Occupy Radio. Two RHAFTS members monitored the chat in the PortSide Zoom, the person using the name Carolina Salguero in the chat is Alyce Erdekian using our account. Carolina was running the cellphone camera.
There were three official presenters:
New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYC EDC or EDC)
The meeting had 3 breakout groups and McCabe’s camera was sometimes in a different group that our cellphone camera handled by our ED Carolina Salguero, so the content of the two documentations is not exactly the same.
There was an updated agenda in the presentation
Land Use & Zoning with DCP, EDC and DOT, facilitator Christina Bottego of CM Alexa Aviles’ office
Transportation Strategies & Infrastructure with DOT and EDC, facilitator SG (we don’t have full name)
Community Engagement Needs, facilitator Bryan Gross, of CM Alexa Aviles’ office
PortSide NewYork coverage
video of the meeting (Zoom); passcode: 7$93Z9Dh. It was useful to have this live option, but the wifi was poor and the sound is poor. Better viewing for after the event is Mike McCabe’s below.
Link to Zoom chat file from the meeting; passcode: 7$93Z9Dh
Edited version of chat file (pdf) with chatter about poor sound quality removed - complete chat file is with the video.
Mike McCabe coverage
Official presentations (pdfs)
The PDFs below are scans of hardcopies. We have requested native/original digital copies because text in this kind of PDF is not searchable, can’t be readily copied, and the complicated maps are harder to read and can’t be readily copied and shared. We will update this page when we get them.
NYC Department of Planning presentation DCP’s role in this topic centers around zoning and land-use with a lot of community pushback on the concept that huge last mile, ecommerce fullfillment centers should be “as of right,” eg. needing no special permits or review.
NYC DOT presentation On this topic, DOT is involved for handling road traffic and its impacts, truck routes, the location and safety of curb cuts, and developing new loading/unloading zones on the street for last mile users. The DOT traffic focus is on traffic on the land, whereas the role of NYC EDC below on this topic is more about use of the waterways to move freight.
NYC EDC presentation The EDC is less known to many people than the DOT or City Planning. The EDC is a large nonprofit, quasi-governmental organization with a huge portfolio of City projects. On this topic, they are often referring to waterborne, maritime options, eg, “the marine highway.” This relates to their role running the NYC Ferry system with the idea that those boats could move freight at night, their role running many city piers via the DockNYC program (PortSide’s ship MARY A. WHALEN is on a DockNYC pier) where those docks could handle inbound or outbound last mile freight, and their role in doing freight planning via the FreightNYC program. Bear in mind that policy papers like FreightNYC are vision and priority statements not detailed operational (action) plans, and that the EDC has a track record of more study than action.
Look for a forthcoming PortSide blogpost explaining all things “marine highway.” For now, the MARAD (federal DOT Maritime Administration) webpage about that is here.
None of the 3 Powerpoints aboved was designed in a way to be easily readable when projected at a public meeting: the fonts were way too small, there was way too much on each page. Even in the front row, it was a strain to the text in the bullet points, and the keys in the color coded maps were impossible to read. We recommend that City presenters design Powerpoints for public meetings that can be read at public meetings!
We suggested to CB6 and Councilmember staff that that the presentations be provided by email BEFORE the meeting so people can actually see and read it and thus more of the meeting can be spent on informed discussion. If not, much of the meeting is spent conveying the official point of view, and a lot of community time is spent on things such as “what’s that slide say?”
Check the new RHAFTS website for lots of info. Contact them at RHAFTS123@gmail.com
Trucks on Van Brunt Street in red hook 6/21/22