August 31, 2026

Mike Flynn

Commissioner

New York City Department of Transportation

55 Water Street

New York NY, 10041

Dear Commissioner Flynn:

We write with an urgent request: make Third Avenue in Sunset Park safe. This past weekend, a hit-and-run driver killed a nurse walking home from work at NYU Langone at the intersection of 55th Street and Third Avenue. Just over a year ago, two pedestrians were struck and killed while crossing at 52nd Street on their way to a local food pantry. Third Avenue between 65th Street and Prospect Avenue remains one of the most dangerous corridors in the entire city, with hundreds of crashes resulting in serious injuries and fatalities over the past few years.

The community in Sunset Park has long clamored for action to make Third Avenue safe. DOT presented the concepts of a Third Avenue redesign to Community Board 7 in 2023, which was subsequently supported by the board in 2024. However, those concepts failed to provide meaningful improvements to the area of Third Avenue where the greatest concentration of vehicular violence and complaints to our offices occur—the streets between 54th Street and 62nd Street.

It is our understanding the Adams administration put a hold on further exploring and fleshing out the concepts of a plan, and the community has been in limbo ever since. There has been no engagement from DOT with the community to explain the delay, or to propose other ideas so that our residents are not mowed down by reckless cars speeding on unsafe roadways. While communication has now resumed under the Mamdani administration, this weekend’s tragedy underscores why DOT must come back to the community with an actual plan, not concepts, as soon as possible. This plan must cover the areas between 65th Street through Prospect Avenue.

Every month of delay is another month of preventable risk to our neighbors who live, work, and go to school along this corridor. This is an emergency and we must treat it as such.

The human cost of further delay is unacceptable. We urge you and the department to re-engage with the community and commit to a road redesign and safety action plan that will keep pedestrians, cyclists, and motorists safe. We ask you to join us to walk this corridor so you can see directly the dangers that the roadway poses to all users. We understand that the geometry of this road is challenging and that there are some jurisdictional concerns with the New York State DOT. However, Third Avenue is a major thoroughfare and we can no longer excuse inaction.

Sincerely,