Sixth Avenue outside arena narrowed beyond promised "curb lane"; situation heightens hazards for vehicles and pedestrians

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When the Barclays Center on 1/30/15 issued a summary of event/production activity associated with NBA All-Star weekend (right), it indicated the production trailers would be placed in the "6th Avenue curb lanes between Atlantic Avenue & Dean Street), and that traffic between Dean and Pacific Street would be northbound only.

That was incomplete, and misleading.

And it obscures significant problems, as documented in photos and videos below, in which those walking in or errantly driving south on the street put themselves in danger.

Yes, production trailers have been placed in the between Atlantic Avenue and Pacific Street in the curb lane, which expands significantly from the street, as indicated by the green arrows in the large photo below.


And other trailers have been placed on the sidewalk at the south and east corners of the arena block, as indicated in blue in the large photo below.

However, additional additional trailers, as shown in the photo at left and highlighted in pink in the photo below, fully occupy a good chunk of the southbound lane between Dean and Pacific streets.

That's not the curb lane. And the situation led several onlookers, in the course of my brief visit yesterday and also conveyed to me by eyewitnesses, to worry about the hazard.

(Videos and photos by AY Info NYC, except for the photo below, from the AY Cam.)

Those additional trailers, combined with the loss of sidewalks, force workers to on the All-Star installation to compete with vehicles in the street, as shown in the video below.

And the overall set-up, as indicated by the purple arrows in the photo above, pose a hazard for pedestrians crossing from the north side of Atlantic Avenue or from the eastern end of the arena. There's no sidewalk immediately available to pedestrians, since the arena side sidewalk is completely blocked and the railyard side sidewalk has yellow hazard tape until the "Do Not Enter" sign. That means people walk in the street.



A circulatory system in a mess

Note that westbound traffic on Pacific Street is not supposed to turn left (southbound) on Sixth Avenue, as indicated in the sign below.

However, the Variable Message Sign on Atlantic Avenue, at least as of yesterday, was telling eastbound drivers approaching the arena that Sixth Avenue southbound was closed, and they should turn on Carlton Avenue. (Update 10:30 am: the sign has been changed, I'm told.)



However, Carlton Avenue is one way northbound once drivers go a single block, and reach Pacific Street. (Remember the wall occasioned by the construction of 535 Carlton Avenue?)

That means drivers yesterday were turning an immediate right on Pacific Street, and driving between the railyard and the Newswalk condo building until they hit Sixth Avenue.

Some of those drivers, as shown in the videos below, turned left, inappropriately.

The hazard on Sixth Avenue

In the first video, four vehicles make a wrong-way left. In the second, an additional car turns left. While some guard-like personnel were outside the construction zone, they were not directing traffic.

Late yesterday, at about 6 pm, the New York Police Department assigned personnel to manage the traffic. I'm not sure how things will go today, but we should learn at the Atlantic Yards Quality of Life meeting tonight.



More photos

Looking north at Sixth Avenue and Pacific Street 

The vehicles stack up at the corner 

Wide-angle view of corner of Dean Street and Sixth Avenue

Construction for the All-Star Weekend

Looking west on Dean Street just west of Sixth Avenue. Parked truck faces against traffic.