For those of us who live, work, and raise our families in the South Bronx, the harms of the Cross Bronx Expressway sit with us each and every day. Built by Robert Moses in the 1950s, the expressway tore through the heart of our neighborhoods, displacing thousands and unleashing decades of pollution, noise, and illness.
The Cross Bronx continues to choke our Black and Latino communities and drive some of the highest rates of asthma and heart disease in New York. But now, Gov. Hochul and the state Department of Transportation are gearing up to repeat this cycle of harm.
Despite our community’s thoughtful visioning process to reimagine the future of the Cross Bronx, NYSDOT is considering widening the expressway with a mile-long traffic diversion road, rather than simply rehabilitating the five bridges lane-by-lane like they do everywhere else.
Their proposal would sacrifice mature forest in Starlight Park and clog the Bronx River with traffic and pollution — directly next to the more than 3,000 residents at Bronx River Houses already suffering from hazardous air quality. While no one disagrees with the need to fix the crumbling infrastructure, NYSDOT’s proposal is deeply flawed.
The Bronx has fought relentlessly for every inch of green space we have. Since the 1970s, we’ve organized to reclaim and restore the historically polluted Bronx River, and have welcomed back thriving animal and plant life. We transformed Starlight Park from a neglected space into a vibrant local asset with sports fields, biking paths, and playgrounds — a place where our children can breathe fresh air and simply be kids.
As mothers and lifelong South Bronx residents — one of us is raising two young children while the other is raising a grandchild here — we represent two generations of Bronxites who have organized for cleaner air and safer parks.
The state’s planned expansion is a direct betrayal of this work.
Far too many children’s health suffers because of policymaking that ignores Bronx residents and our needs. For years Nilka bore the crushing weight of caring for a son without knowing the source of his asthma: the Cross Bronx. Registering his asthma pump at school wasn’t unique; every year, hundreds of inhalers lined the nurse’s inventory, the only medicine available if he or a peer found themselves gasping for air.
Here, even the most mundane activities expose our children to harm — opening a window coated in film from traffic fumes or breathing polluted air at any of the 66 parks and playgrounds within a half-mile of the Cross Bronx.
Consequently, students, parents, teachers, and residents from Emerita’s Assembly district and beyond have consistently opposed widening the expressway. It’s why we wrote directly to the governor and DOT Commissioner Marie Therese Dominguez, advocating for the state to halt the expansion, and pressing for transparency, bilingual outreach, and extended public comment.
Adding a traffic diversion structure to the expressway simply means more traffic, idling trucks, asthma attacks, and heart disease in the borough that ranked dead last in health outcomes for the 17th consecutive year.
NYSDOT’s plans are all too reminiscent of the Moses era of governance; true progress means treating residents as real partners in urban planning.
Local advocates have already devised a viable set of alternatives that will protect the Bronx River, Starlight Park, and future generations, while making long-overdue improvements to the Cross Bronx corridor. These include investing in cleaner ways to move people and goods with better transit, safer walking and biking routes, and new bus lanes.
We need to create a green land bridge that connects Bronx River Houses to Starlight Park, and finally link the thousands of local residents isolated by the expressway. It’s also beyond time to start shifting freight off polluting trucks and onto rail and waterways — a path New York has already begun to implement in Hunts Point. These are practical ideas shaped by the people who live here, and they point to a healthier, more just future than pouring more concrete.
The Bronx has carried the burden of New York’s traffic and pollution — and that of the entire New England region — for long enough. We’re tired of being a place where trucks and cargo simply pass through, and can’t afford another flawed decision-making process that’ll bring long-lasting harm. We’re calling on the governor to invest in truly sustainable alternatives. This is an opportunity to undo the Cross Bronx’s legacy of harm and rewrite the future of the corridor. Don’t squander it.
Torres represents parts of the Bronx in the state Assembly. Martell is the founder of Loving the Bronx, and chairwoman of the Bronx River Alliance.
