There’s Traffic-Cone Drama on Vanderbilt Avenue

Saskia Haegens was getting things in order for the May launch of the Vanderbilt Avenue Open Street. They, along with other organizers, had put in requests to the city’s Department of Transportation for the usual slate of equipment to close off the strip to traffic and entice pedestrians to come hang out: dozens of French barriers and an assortment of tables and chairs. And, just like last year, they also asked for 100 traffic cones. But when city officials dropped off the supplies in April, there were only 30 of them. “They were low on furniture and chairs,” Haegens tells me. “But the cones?” Over in Astoria, organizers with the 31st Street Open Street say they fared even worse, receiving no cones after putting in a request for 20. (“I’m a little confused,” says Bobby Feltault, vice-chair of the 31st Avenue Open Street Collective.) Something was up.

Bill de Blasio’s pandemic-era plan to turn typically car-filled streets over to pedestrian idling has proved popular among a majority of New Yorkers: As my colleague Kim Velsey wrote last year, the impromptu community plazas reduce vehicle crashes and injuries while boosting revenue for businesses along the corridor. They’re also just nice. But the programs — which, per a new report by comptroller Brad Lander’s office — don’t have a dedicated budget or funding source and are struggling. According to Haegens, Vanderbilt Avenue organizers slashed their operating hours by half this year (the Open Street only happens on Saturdays now, down from Friday through Sunday a couple of years ago) as a cost-cutting measure. In 2023, Vanderbilt’s operating budget was $200,000 thanks to a mix of private and city funds. This year, it is making due with $60,000. And while the city says a record number of Open Streets sites are set to launch this year, the comptroller’s report found the number of them has dropped from 326 in 2021 to 232 in 2024. (The DoT has disputed this count.) So were the cones just another symptom of a struggling program?

Not according to the city. A spokesperson for the Department of Transportation, Will Livingston, tells me there is no traffic-cone shortage. Rather, he says, the agency is simply changing how it distributes the current number of cones across Open Streets sites. (As for the zero-cone allotment to 31st Avenue, Livingston says the strip was in the middle of a redesign that would require fewer cones.)

But Haegens called their strip’s 30 cones a “joke.” Vanderbilt Avenue organizers use them to mark the bike lanes along the six-block stretch to prevent cyclists from mowing down children chalking the pavement or 50-year-olds dancing to a jazz quartet. The cones are also crucial, Haegens says, to alert nighttime drivers if the metal barriers are still blocking off parts of the road. Haegens tried to plead with the city: “Can you please give us more cones?” No such luck. “They said, ‘Sorry, we don’t have anymore. This is all you get.’”

So what’s an Open Street that’s short on cones left to do? The 31st Avenue organizers are weighing dipping into their savings or using grant money to boost their supply of cones. Haegens and the other organizers for Vanderbilt, meanwhile, sent out a request to their thousands-strong mailing list: “Adopt a cone” — $30 apiece. “Turns out they’re not super-cheap,” Haegens says. In less than 24 hours, the effort had raised around $2,100, enough to cover the missing markers. How will Haegens thank these patrons? “People really like the idea of getting their name on a cone.”