49 New Elevators Are Coming To Queensbridge Houses

LONG ISLAND CITY, QUEENS — NYCHA is finally rising to the challenge of chronic elevator outages with a plan to replace 165 elevators in its public housing developments, including several dozen elevators in Queensbridge Houses.

The plan, which the housing authority's independent watchdog approved Thursday, calls for 49 new elevators in Queensbridge North at a cost of nearly $22 million, records show. The work will take until January 2024 to finish.

At Queensbridge North, where an estimated 25 percent of residents are seniors or have mobility issues, the elevators date back to 1994, according to NYCHA records.

Under the $450 million plan, NYCHA will use state funds to install new elevators and boilers at 25 public housing developments across the city. The agency looked at work orders and the age of the equipment to determine which elevators and boilers to replace, NYCHA federal monitor Bart M. Schwartz said.

Workers will replace a total of 148 elevator cars and 108 boilers, according to a description of the plan.

"This is a remarkable first step towards dramatically improving the lives of NYCHA residents," NYCHA Chair and CEO Greg Russ said in a statement.