A bigger highway or none at all?

Once the highway was gone, new pathways would link residential Longwood to parks and a greenway along the Bronx River, according to a report by Joan Byron, a senior fellow at the Pratt Institute Center for Community and Environmental Development, which is part of the Alliance.

Both sides contend that their ideas would improve traffic efficiency and safety while reducing the air pollution caused by the traffic that roars along local highways and streets.

When the DOT announced its rankings for the various alternatives at the February meeting of Community Board 2, residents and board members clashed, with some lining up with the state agency, others with Watershed Alliance.

“Where will the traffic go?” shouted one resident, when Menaka Mohan of Sustainable South Bronx, who acts as the Alliance coordinator, described the plan. Some groaned, calling the Sheridan an important part of their daily commute. Others just scoffed or shook their heads as the coalition of several South Bronx grassroots organizations tried to defend the teardown alternative.

“The fact that the Community Plan ranks lower than the State DOT’s expansion plan is faulty,” said Mohan in an e-mail. She said the DOT had “made several errors,” including mapping one-way streets incorrectly and failing to take the size of the area into account.

According to Mohan, an independent consultant hired by the Watershed Alliance concluded that the community plan would attract $700 million in new development and create 700 permanent jobs in the South Bronx.

The DOT will make a written response to the criticism, said John Miller of Dewberry Consulting, the firm that analyzed traffic for the environmental impact statement.

The businesses in the Hunts Point food markets want to see traffic eased, and are skeptical about the community plan.

“I believe in the greening of the Bronx, but let’s not fix one thing and make something else worse,” said Vincent Pacifico, CEO of Vista Foods, a longtime tenant in the Hunts Point Food Co-op.

Pacifico, who has a reputation for supporting efforts to revitalize the Bronx River, said he wasn’t sure the solutions offered by the DOT, which is studying four ways to improve the Sheridan, in addition to the plan to tear it down, will work, either.

But he said something has to be done. “Coming home at the end of the day, the drivers wait for 30 or 40 minutes at the Hunts Point exit off the Bruckner. Sitting there they release diesel fumes. And paying them overtime is a personal factor that I have to deal with,” said Pacifico, whose firm owns more than 70 trucks.

The Watershed Alliance calls for elevating the Bruckner Expressway between Hunts Point Avenue and the east bank of the Bronx River, saying that would both cut down on the congestion that plagues the road and eliminate safety hazards.

All of the remaining alternatives to keep and renovate the Sheridan would include the expansion of the Bruckner Expressway to six lanes over the Bronx River and reconfigured ramps around the Bruckner and Bronx River area.

Majora Carter, executive director of Sustainable South Bronx, charged that state officials “don’t really want to study” the Watershed Alliance’s proposal. Meeting with the staff of The Hunts Point Express, she said, “They’d actually rather just study an alternative that would build a bigger highway, so now we’re totally advocating with our electeds, with business leaders, and with various community leaders to help push all four alternatives as they are written so everything will stand on its own merits and we won’t be dismissed.”

In addition to Sustainable South Bronx and the Pratt Center, the organizations making up the alliance are Mothers on the Move, Youth Ministries for Peace and Justice and the Tri-State Transportation Campaign.

Assemblyman Ruben Diaz, Council Member Maria del Carmen Arroyo, and Congressman Jose Serrano all wrote letters asking the DOT to continue to study the alternative of tearing down the Sheridan.