Paving Peninsula

In 2011 Peninsula Boulevard between Rockaway Turnpike in Lawrence/Cedarhurst and Mill Road in Hewlett was extensively dug-up for water main and water pipe replacement work. No one questions the need to upgrade and maintain our water and sewer systems – we’re grateful that capital funds were available for this purpose. However, long sections of the street were trenched-out just like Doughboys would have done in World War I. While the trenches were refilled and new asphalt put over it, the are vast sections of Peninsula that are basically “new rut city.”

Driving what is supposed to be our fastest-moving thoroughfare has become a nonstop series of jolts to the undersides of our cars as motorists deal with ruts, uneven pavement and even some blossoming, burgeoning craters opening-up here and there (note: avoid the big pothole in the left eastbound lane near Mill, around the CVS, it could easily bend your alloy wheels). No two lanes are the same in whatever direction and the quality of the pavement even within one lane can vary foot by foot.

We understand that similar pipe work was done to the water lines in places like Oceanside, East Rockaway and Hempstead and that multi-mile sections of major roads in these towns were repaved completely cub-to-curb. Peninsula wasn’t in the greatest of shape before the pipe work and is definitely the worse for wear now. There has been no definitive plan put forth by the County’s Department of Public Works to address the needs of Peninsula Blvd. This is a significant east-west artery stretching across half the county. It carries a lot of commercial traffic which also exacts a huge amount of wear and tear on the pavement. There are only about four to five months remaining in 2012 when the weather would be appropriate for repaving. We fear that the County may abdicate its responsibility in 2012 to rectify this situation and that Peninsula will be left to deteriorate further during the coming winter when snow, ice and rock salt will wreak havoc on the already tender and rutted roadway. We call on the County to do the right thing and repave Peninsula from stem to stern so that those living in and around the street and those needing to use it daily to get across the county will not have to dodge ruts, lace-work/latticework mini-holes and the emerging potholes just to get from point-A to point-B. This is a basic quality-of-life issue. Suburban streets ought not resemble those on the other side of the city line or aspire to do so – it’s one of the reasons we pay stratospheric taxes so we don’t have to.