OUR HISTORY AND LEADERSHIP

Jim Burke, Volunteer Chair, TA Queens Activist Committee

Steve Scofield, Social Ride Coordinator, TA Queens Activist Committee

Juan Restrepo, TA Queens Organizer

The Transportation Alternatives Queens Committee believes that no one should die or be injured simply for commuting through Queens while riding a bike or walking down the street. We organize Queens residents to fight for street redesigns including protected bike lanes, safer crosswalks, and other important elements to make our streets safer for everyone. Our engagement efforts include social rides, community events, and campaigns for better infrastructure.

Formed in the early 1990s and re-formed in 2007, the Queens Committee has helped to dramatically alter the street landscape of Western and Central Queens over the last decade. Recently, Queens Committee members led the fight to fill in the “missing link” to Queens Boulevard and helped secure the Mayor’s commitment to install protected bike lanes on Skillman and 43rd Avenues in Sunnyside and Woodside. This hard-fought campaign involved petitioning, canvassing, op-eds, marches, business outreach, turn out to community meetings and town halls and the formation of Queens’ first-ever People Protected Bike Lane.

The Queens Committee’s biggest success story is #bikeQNS’s crown jewel: the 10 miles of protected bike lanes running through the heart of our borough on Queens Boulevard. The “Zero on Queens Boulevard” campaign began in 2008 after the death of Asif Raman while biking. His mother, Lizi, and his family joined members of the Queens Committee to call on the city to fix this “Boulevard of Death” in 2008. Ten years and two mayors later, ten miles of the dangerous road have been redesigned, not only providing safe direct biking infrastructure, but also delivering dramatically improved safety for pedestrians and drivers as well. Since the redesign began in 2014, there have been zero pedestrian or cycling fatalities on Queens Boulevard. This transformation from the “Boulevard of Death” to the “Boulevard of Life” is an inspiration for the entire city and is now used as a template for how to fix broken, deadly streets around the country.

Another transformative and hard-fought campaign was the 111th Street redesign near Flushing Meadows-Corona Park. This four-year effort involved partnering with essential coalition partners like Mujeres en Movimentos, Make the Road NY, the Queens Museum, and Council Member Julissa Ferreras. The end result is one of the most successful bike lane projects in Queens, that’s used every day by hundreds of Corona residents, families and children to easily and safely access the park.

Additional past successes include the protected bike lane over the Pulaski Bridge connecting Brooklyn to Queens, protected bike lanes near Astoria Park, pedestrian plazas in Corona and Jackson Heights, greenway bike lanes at Queens Plaza North, and protected bike lanes on the LIC waterfront on Vernon Boulevard.