Park Slope Avenue Traffic To Change Direction 'Until Further Notice'

PARK SLOPE, BROOKLYN — Traffic will change direction on a swath of Sixth Avenue later this month in an effort to keep streets clear for a local fire house, officials tell Patch. What the city has yet to disclose is when the change will end.

The six-block stretch of Sixth Avenue between Prospect Place and Union Street will change direction on June 27 and "until further notice," signs posted by the city's Design and Construction department show.

The traffic change — which will direct vehicles toward Flatbush Avenue and not away from it — is a move meant to channel traffic away from Union Street, city officials said.

The Sixth Avenue traffic change is tied to BED798, a much-maligned water main replacement project in northern Park Slope.

A Design and Construction spokesperson told Patch the change comes at the behest of the Fire department, which has a station that sits on Union Street between Sixth and Seventh avenues.

"The decision," the spokesperson said, "was the result of FDNY’s concerns about increased traffic on Union Street where a firehouse is located."

Three departments — Transportation, Fire and Construction — held a meeting and agreed to change the direction, the spokesperson said.

The theory is that they'll ease traffic on Union Street by providing drivers another avenue to travel to Flatbush, the spokesperson said.

The FDNY confirmed this to Patch via email.

Design and Construction representatives also noted the change is only temporary, but the notices that appeared on Sixth Avenue do not include an end date and the city did not supply one.

BED798 has already been lambasted by neighbors for dragging on years beyond what initially anticipated, and causing construction nightmares in the process, locals told Patch.

The project was initially proposed as a three-year process needed to replace Park Slope's 100-plus year old water mains, which carry almost all of Southern Brooklyn's drinking water and have been leaking for years, according to the DDC.

Construction, though, began four years ago, a spokesperson said, with plans for the project dating back as many as six years, according to DDC documents from 2016.

It has been delayed by the pandemic and "utility interference," but is only 14 percent over budget, the spokesperson added.