“Open Streets” Return for School Year, UWS Sees Only 5 Closures

Plenty of “Open Streets” will be coming to Manhattan this fall, in conjuncture with the school year, the NYC Department of Transportation has announced. There will be a record-breaking 72 street closures citywide, 23 of which will be in Manhattan but only five will fall within the confines of the UWS.

The vast majority of the schools that will see street closures are private institutions, by more than a 3:1 ratio. The Upper West Side will be modestly represented, with five schools in the area on the list.

The Manhattan closures be located at the following schools and streets, for starters: The Dalton School (E. 91st St.), The École (E. 22nd St.), P.S. 042–The Benjamin Altman School (Hester Street), The Nightingale Bamford School (E. 92nd St.), The Academy of St. Joseph (Washington Place), The Buckley School (E. 73rd St.), Saint David’s School (E. 89th St.), Manhattan Day School (W. 75th St.), P.S. 343–The Peck Slip School (Peck Slip), Collegiate School (Freedom Place South), and the P.S. 003– Charrette School (Grove St., Bedford St.).

There will be also be closures at The Allen-Stevenson School (E. 78th St.), Friends Seminary (Rutherford Place), City-As School (Clarkson St.), Community Health Academy of the Heights (W. 158th St.), I.S. 528 Bea Fuller Rogers School (Wadsworth Ave.), P.S. 112 Jose Celso Barbosa (E. 119th St.), Washington Irving Educational Campus (Irving Place), Harlem Children’s Zone Promise Academy II Elementary School (E. 111th St.), The Birch Wathen Lenox School (E. 77th St.), and Global Community Charter School (W. 142nd St.)

“Through our Open Streets program, we have created a new framework to reimagine the use of street space outside schools so students can safely learn, develop new skills, and their parents and guardians can have easier pick-ups and drop-offs,” DOT Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez said in a statement.

“Open Streets has brought new energy and joy to our school community,” Bea Fuller Rodgers Intermediate School 528 assistant principal Genelly Cornelio said. “It’s given our students space to learn, play, and connect in fresh and meaningful ways — turning each day into an opportunity for movement, creativity, and togetherness.”

The DOT will also be continuing the “We’re Walking Here” contest, a related safety education initiative, in which students “create public service announcement videos to warn of the dangers of reckless driving and traffic fatalities.” The four winners of last year’s contest can be found online, while submissions for this year’s contest are being accepted until Oct. 3.

The Birch Wathen Lenox School’s E. 77th St. street closure, specifically, has already been the source of a fair bit of drama. When the school first came before Community Board 8 last year, hoping to earn its advisory blessing of the closure plans, it was roundly shot down; a majority of board members objected to the school shutting down the street for five hours a day.

That motion of disapproval changed to a motion of approval by this July, however, when the school agreed to reorient its Open Streets application around shorter hours. After representatives from the school apologized to CB8 for prior miscommunication, they issued a unanimous resolution supporting the revised application by a measure of 42-0.

Since the Department of Transportation is ultimately responsible for signing off on Open Streets applications, it appears that they were suitably impressed by Birch Wathen’s revised plans, as well.