THIS IS 'L' ON EARTH!
Nabe fury at noisy 14th St. subway work
The L-train shutdown is still seven months away, but East Villagers say they’re already going through hell.
Nonstop construction spanning two blocks on East 14th Street near the First Avenue station is costing residents their sleep and sanity, while businesses are losing customers and cash.
“It’s like living in the middle of a war zone,” said Stuyvesant Town resident Scott Francis, 47. “It’s dirty, loud, terrible and disgusting.”
Traffic is reduced to one lane, stores are blocked off by fences, parts of sidewalks are closed, several 70-year-old trees were cut down, and diesel generators, drills, compressors and bulldozers are running from 7 a.m. to almost midnight. Soon the MTA will begin working 24/7 underground.
The massive operation between First Avenue and Avenue B is all in preparation for the stop to serve as a “staging zone” for workers to take old materials out from the East River tunnel and put new components in. The large shafts will then be converted into elevators and stairway openings to the subway once the project is complete in 2020.
Similar shafts are also being installed at the Bedford and 6th Avenue L stations.
Though the MTA broke ground a year ago, the $925 million project’s scope — and the disturbance it causes — has steadily grown. “It gets worse and worse every day,” Francis said.
Incessant drilling, hammering and banging has some Stuy Town residents red-eyed and sleep deprived. “If you don’t sleep during the exact seven-hour window when they let up, you won’t be getting any rest,” said Daniel Wishnoff, 56, whose sixth-floor apartment overlooks the chaos. “It’s so loud and intrusivee that it doesn’t matterr what you do, you’ree gonna hear it.”
Other residents in Wishnoff’s building — where a one-bedroom rents for $3,800 a month — say high-intensity spotlights beam into their bedrooms.
“It’s like the sun is shining directly into the window,” said Su Patel, 73.
Across the street at acupuncture shop H&N Herbal, customers are running out because of the grating sounds.
“People are coming in, laying down and then the drilling starts,” said an unnamed clerk at the store. “They say, ‘ No, no, this is no good’ and want to leave.”
The owner of nearby Dion Cleaners said his revenue has been cut in half over the last six months.
“I don’t know if we’ll make it through this,” John Chang, 60, yelled over a cacophony of bulldozers as he looked out his mudsplattered window.
“This is a critical repair project on an accelerated timeline,” said MTA spokesman Shams Tarek. “We’re committed to being good neighbors, and we’re going to hold our contractors to very high standards.”
Tarek added that they “are developing plans with city agencies to help local businesses.”