Douglas Manor Leaders Call on City to Speed up Shore Road Upgrade

Douglaston community leaders said they are aggravated that the city is moving slowly to fix a deteriorating stretch of Shore Road, which they believe is becoming increasingly dangerous.

The road's upgrade is estimated to cost $3.1 million and was originally scheduled to begin in October 2011, Community Board 11 District Manager Susan Seinfeld said.

But civic leaders from Douglas Manor, the section of Douglaston in which Shore Road is located, said the design and construction for the project is still in the proposal phase.

They said they believe the city is not moving quickly enough to break ground on the upgrade.

"It's a dangerous situation," said Bernard Haber, chairman of CB 11's transportation committee. "The road has been bad now for a number of years. The city has done some intermediate repairs from time to time to help. But it's gotten so bad that the road is now closed in two areas, restricting it to one lane."

The DOT could not be reached for comment.

Two separate stretches of 150-feet of Shore Road's western side along Little Neck Bay are closed at Bay View and Hollywood avenues.

Haber said residents in the community first noticed damage to Shore Road in 1992. A section of the road has collapsed at its intersection with Bay View Road, while another portion along Shore between Manor Road and Hollywood Avenue is deteriorating.

George Schmidt, chairman of the Douglas Manor Association's Shore Road Construction Committee, said the cause of the road's collapse is unknown.

There has been speculation whether leaking water mains or an underground spring caused the deterioration. Heavy rainstorms have caused damage along Shore Road, preventing it from draining properly, said Susan Seinfeld, district manager of CB 11.

The city's Design and Construction Department will repair, repave and reconstruct up a total 3,700 feet of road along Shore as well as West Drive, Beverly Road and 36th Avenue, Seinfeld said.

"It's bad," she said. "The edge of the road is falling down."

Schmidt said the DOT told the Douglas Manor Association in late October that it would hold a community meeting to discuss the project. But residents have been calling on the city to fix the road for several years.

"It's ongoing and it's very frustrating to us because they are moving at a snail's pace," he said. "It's been three years and we haven't even gotten through the design phase. It's hard to deal with that type of lethargy. We're trying our best, but it's becoming a dangerous situation. I'm afraid someone will get hurt."