NYC Ferry routes coming to the Lower East Side and the Bronx this summer
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Two neighborhoods underserved by transit will get a bit more accessible this summer. Mayor Bill de Blasio announced on Wednesday that construction has officially kicked off for new NYC Ferry landings on the Lower East Side and in the Soundview neighborhood of the Bronx. Skanska USA will construct four docks at Corlears Hook, East 90th Street and Stuyvesant Cove on the East River as well as at Clason Point Park in Soundview. According to the city, the new LES and Bronx routes will serve more than 1.4 million riders each year.
The Lower East Side route will take riders to Wall Street in nine minutes and to Midtown in 17 minutes. Stops include Wall Street’s Pier 11, Corlears Hook, Stuyvesant Cove, East 34th Street and Long Island City. The total trip is expected to take just 32 minutes.
The Soundview route will better connect Upper East Side and Bronx residents to jobs in Midtown and lower Manhattan. Stops include Clason Point, East 90th Street, East 34th Street and Pier 11. From start to finish, the ride takes under an hour.
De Blasio said the idea behind the NYC Ferry was to increase economic opportunities and link people to other parts of the city. Plus, unlike the construction of new subway lines, the ferry is much faster and simpler way of increasing transit options.
“But here’s the bottom line,” de Blasio said at an event announcing the new docks, “there are so many reasons to like NYC Ferry but again it comes back to the most essential reason. It’s to help us create a fairer city.”
In NYC Ferry’s first operating year in 2017, the system launched four routes in the Rockaways, Astoria, Brooklyn and the East River. During the height of the subway’s meltdown, nearly three million commuters flocked to the ferry, surpassing the city’s original projections by over 30 percent.
This high demand caused the ferry to add six-higher capacity boats, each with larger engines and a 349-passenger capacity. The first three will arrive in the New York Harbor sometime this summer.
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