Blasio’s doomed streetcar desire
BQX ‘going to die’ amid feud with Cuo
Mayor de Blasio’s $2.5 billion plan to connect the Brooklyn and Queens waterfronts with a 16-mile streetcar line is headed nowhere, sources say.
Two sources tied to the Brooklyn-Queens Connector project told The Post Thursday they believe it will crash before takeoff — partly because of de Blasio’s strained relationship with Gov. Cuomo and the state.
“It’s going to die,” said one source. “This is not an administration that can pull it over the finish line.”
City Hall has long claimed that the project, which was announced in de Blasio’s February 2016 State of the City Address, can move ahead without state involvement.
But the sources said slivers of state-controlled land are in the way.
They also said the city has yet to develop a plan to integrate the streetcar system — known as “BQX” — with the subway and bus systems so that passengers can transfer for free.
“It is all about the governor,” said the source. “This BQX will have to pass over state-owned pieces of land, and the governor . . . can just say ‘no.’
“Also, the MTA has not said it will make the BQX part of the MetroCard system. It can’t work without that — no matter what the mayor has said publicly.
“The whole purpose of the BQX is not only to connect the waterfronts, it is to connect them to subways and buses.”
De Blasio spokesman Wiley Norvell insisted the city can design a route running from Sunset Park, Brooklyn, to Astoria, Queens, without any state land.
He said that although integrating the BQX fare system with the MTA is crucial, the project could move forward without an agreement while sides negotiate a revenue-sharing plan for the fares.
The MTA declined to comment. But a source at the agency said it has bigger issues than de Blasio’s project.
“I have no idea what the ridership projections are for BQX, but there are 6 million subway riders and that is what everyone should be focused on,” the source said.
State transportation officials said they couldn’t comment on state land potentially needed for the BQX because the city has never presented any plans.
Cuomo’s office didn’t return calls.
Norvell said the city is in the process of trying to determine whether the project can be selffinanced. He added that financing — not de Blasio’s relationship with Cuomo — will determine whether the streetcar ever gets rolling.
The BQX has to go through a lengthy approval process, with construction targeted to begin in 2019 and service in 2024.