May 6, 2026 - Brooklyn Downtown Star

Brooklyn Electeds Renew Call to Repave Broadway

BQE Admin on May 6, 2026

Local elected Chi Osse (center), Sandy Nurse (right) and Antonio Reynoso (left) spoke at a rally by Thomas Boyland Park on Wednesday, April 29. Photo by Cole Sinanian.

Lawmakers and residents alike are fed up with the ragged roadway that runs through Bed-Stuy and Bushwick. Can they finally repair it?

BY COLE SINANIAN

cole@queensledger.com

BED-STUY— Brooklyn’s Broadway corridor has always been bumpy. Up until the 1950s, what is now the shadowy underside of the elevated J Train was a cobblestone thoroughfare traversed by the Broadway Line streetcar.

Now of course, the streetcar is long gone and the cobblestones have been paved over, leaving pedestrians and motorists alike to contend with a minefield of potholes and cracked asphalt that can turn a simple car ride into a torturous affair.

“If you know anything about Broadway, you get in the car and you’re going to be slapped back and forth,” said Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso at a recent press conference on the corner of Broadway and Granite St. “You might need a neck brace by the time you make it down six blocks.”

Straddling Bushwick and Bed-Stuy and stretching roughly from Howard Ave to the east and Flushing Ave to the West, the Broadway Corridor has long been a source of ire for local residents, who’ve urged elected officials for years to address both the poor state of the roadway and rampant crime and drug use that’s plagued the poorly lit space below the tracks. During the historic blackouts in the summer of 1977, it was the site of major rioting and looting that at one point left two full blocks of Broadway on fire. Nowadays, the Department of Transportation has identified the corridor as among the top 10% most dangerous in Brooklyn, with an average of 14.8 people killed or severely injured (KSI) per mile.

It’s no help that Broadway forms the border of several different political districts, allowing local electeds to defer responsibility for its repairs to their neighboring representatives. The north side of the Broadway Corridor spans City Council District 34, State Assembly District 53, State Senate District 18, and Congressional District 7, while the south side — or the Bed-Stuy portion — encompasses City Council District 36, State Assembly District 56, State Senate District 25, and Congressional District 8.

But now, as the Mamdani Administration doubles down on its commitment to “pothole politics” — or the idea that trust in government can be cultivated by addressing small, everyday issues that affect New Yorkers’ qualities of life — a coalition of Brooklyn elected officials whose districts touch the corridor are renewing calls to fund its total repavement.

At the press conference, held Wednesday, April 29th next to Thomas Boyland Park, Reynoso, alongside City Councilmembers Chi Ossé and Sandy Nurse as well as several local community board leaders, spoke passionately about the state of the roadway as the J train rumbled overhead. A group of community members from the surrounding Bed-Stuy, Bushwick and Ocean Hill neighborhoods stood behind the speakers, holding up photos of some of the road’s ugliest blemishes.

“It’s disgusting, it’s unsafe for both drivers and cyclists and pedestrians,” Ossé said. “This is the wealthiest city and wealthiest country in the world, and this corridor does not speak to that.”

Ossé and Reynoso both pledged to contribute $1 million to funding the corridor’s repavement, a far cry from the estimated $110 million that Nurse a total restructuring of the corridor would likely cost. They also highlighted the necessity of the elevated train to the area’s residents and the relative lack of investment in road infrastructure in comparison to other parts of the city.

“This elevated train was deeply important to Brooklyn and getting us around,” Reynoso said. “But what happens is they built that infrastructure and then forgot about it, they just built it and left us alone. They abandoned this community. They neglected this community. They don’t make long-term investments.”

Ossé also evoked the famous Myrtle/Broadway intersection, which has become an internet meme in recent years for its disorienting and contradictory atmosphere. The intersection is perhaps most famous for its trio of oddly placed fast food joints — the Popeyes, Checkers and Dunkin Donuts nestled side by side.

Ossé jokingly referred to the intersection as a “cultural heritage site,” before taking a more serious tone.

“As much as it has become a joke within meme culture, it speaks to the broader need for investment within this entire corridor,” the second-term City Councilmember said.

Speaking at the press conference, Brooklyn Community Board 4 and longtime Bushwick resident Roberto Camacho drew attention to the costs incurred by drivers whose cars are damaged by Broadway’s potholes.

“How much money do you think people pay when their cars get damaged and their insurance goes up with no fault of their own?” Camacho said. “Or some senior trips and breaks their ankle and gets hurt and they have no health coverage? It’s an investment that helps everyone.”

Community Board 16 District Manager Sydone Thompson, meanwhile, called out the city’s inaction in fixing the Broadway corridor and urged all Brooklynites who use the road to support the initiative.

“The Broadway corridor, the entire span affects all of our districts— Bed-Stuy, Bushwick, all of it,” she said. “So we all need to fight. We need every elected from every level of government to put the money where your mouth is, because I’m tired of my car breaking an axle on Broadway.”

She continued: “I think the city needs to understand [that] for the amount of money you would pay out in lawsuits, you can fix this.”

COBB: The Colorful Characters of Leonard Street’s Past

BQE Admin on May 6, 2026

Actor Mickey Rooney (left) and gangster Al Capone (right) both spent time on Leonard Street. Photos via Wikimedia.

From Hollywood stars to brutal gangsters, the unassuming Greenpoint street has hosted a multitude of colorful characters.

GEOFFREY COBB | gcobb91839@Aol.com

Author, “Greenpoint Brooklyn’s Forgotten Past

A friend, John Dereszewski, who lived for many years on Leonard Street, recently posted some memories of his days on the street on Facebook, so I thought I would expand on them and write a piece about this quiet local thoroughfare. The street was once the Eastern end of the Meserole farm, but as the neighborhood grew, the Meserole family sold off the area. It was surveyed and a street was created running through the former farm. The street, named after Superintendent of School Buildings Samuel Leonard – who oversaw the building of nearby P.S. #34 – opened in 1852 and ran from Broadway in Williamsburg to the now long-gone Bushwick Creek. In 1865, it was extended to Greenpoint Avenue.

The street was once home to one of the most feared mobsters, Sonny Franseze who grew up on the corner of Leonard Street and Jackson Street. Reputedly legendary gangster Al Capone carved his name into a social club there owned by the Franzese family. Sonny, allegedly a longtime underboss in the Colombo crime family, was reputedly inducted into the mafia as a teenager. Sentenced to 50 years in prison for allegedly orchestrating a number of bank robberies across the country in 1967, he was paroled in 1978; however, Franzese was re-jailed at least six times on parole violations in the decades that followed. He is alleged to have killed between 30 and 60 people during his career as a Mafia enforcer. In 2017 at the age of 100, he became the oldest federal inmate in the United States and the only centenarian in federal custody. He was released and lived three more years until his death at age 103 in 2020.

The block between Driggs and Nassau contains two noteworthy buildings on its west side. A former Protestant church became for many years the Greenpoint Knights of Columbus meeting hall. The Knights became famous for marching in their full regalia during Greenpoint’s frequent parades and processions. Later, the St. Stan’s American Legion post, home to many brave veterans, shared the building with them. Down the block was a former public-school building that became The Polish War Veterans Club. Many of the heroes of the storming on Monte Casino during World War II settled in Greenpoint and became members of the club. When they died off, the club closed and eventually became a condominium apartment.

The office of Doctor McCartney, a beloved local physician who treated locals for decades, was situated about midway between Nassau and Norman Avenues. Further down the street, on the corner of Leonard and Norman Avenue is my favorite Polish flower shop, Paradise Florists, run by a Polish family for decades. Their beautiful bouquets for my wife have gotten me out of the doghouse on many occasions. Across the street from the flower shop is the Greenpoint branch of the library. Sadly, it was once an elegant Carnegie Library with a graceful marble façade. In the 1960s, the buildings foundation was found to be unstable and instead of repairing this architectural gem, it was torn down and lost forever, replaced by a drab modern structure that thankfully also has been replaced by the nicer present library.

Around the corner from the library, on the west side of the block was the home of legendary politician Peter McGuinness, whom I described in my book The King of Greenpoint. The political leader of the area between World War I and World War II, McGuinness was beloved both for his kindness and great sense of humor. He was honored when Oakland Street was widened and named McGuinness Boulevard. Though McGuinness lived in an apartment in the building, he never owned it. This political power broker remained a renter all his life. Longtime local physician Doctor Smith had his office on the block. Smith was an old-fashioned general practitioner who delivered many local babies until a heart attack prevented him from doing it. A thing of the past, he often made home visits to treat severely sick patients.

One of the greatest actors ever was born on the corner of Meserole Avenue and Leonard Street, Oscar award winning actor Mickey Rooney, whose parents were local Vaudeville actors. In a career spanning nearly nine decades, he appeared in more than 300 films and was among the last surviving stars of the silent-film era. He was the top box-office attraction from 1939 to 1941, becoming one of the best-paid actors of that era. 678 Leonard Street is the home of the Polish National Church, which differs from the Catholic Church, to which the vast majority of Poles belong.

Heading north, one sees the rear of the Saint Anthony of Padua church, whose school educated many local children. Sister Francis Kress, a nun , taught in the parish school, while also becoming the first community member to alert the local community about the many environmental dangers posed by our long history of industrialization. At the very end of the street, one finds my favorite local watering Hole Tempkins, where a beer is the perfect way to end this little journey up Leonard Street.

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