{"id":195661,"date":"2026-04-13T17:19:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T17:19:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/195661\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T17:19:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T17:19:10","slug":"mamdani-plans-to-ban-cars-on-part-of-grand-army-plaza-connect-arch-to-prospect-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/195661\/","title":{"rendered":"Mamdani plans to ban cars on part of Grand Army Plaza, connect arch to Prospect Park"},"content":{"rendered":"<p data-block-key=\"fmi0h\">The city transportation department plans to ban cars from the southern edge of Grand Army Plaza in a move that will connect the Soldiers&#8217; and Sailors&#8217; Memorial Arch directly to Prospect Park, Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced Monday.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"85h99\">The change, which advocates have demanded for years, won\u2019t entirely eliminate traffic from the circle around the arch. But it would ban the direct connection for cars between Union Street and Eastern Parkway, and route that traffic around the northern side of the circle. The plan would convert the roadways looping around the arch from one-way into two-way streets.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"e4hc\">There\u2019s currently no set budget or timeline for the plan. Representatives for Mamdani did not say when construction would begin.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"9ig2p\">The city already plans to move forward with a redesign to add bus lanes and concrete islands to Flatbush Avenue just north of the plaza this year, a <a href=\"https:\/\/gothamist.com\/news\/nyc-to-drivers-avoid-northern-part-of-flatbush-avenue-as-street-gets-bus-friendly-rebuild\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">monthslong project<\/a> that officials said will come with major traffic disruptions.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"fmldm\">The transportation department under former Mayor Eric Adams in 2022 considered making more parts of Grand Army Plaza car-free by creating a <a href=\"https:\/\/gothamist.com\/news\/exclusive-dot-eyes-brooklyns-grand-army-plaza-as-nycs-next-car-free-space\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\">direct pedestrian connection from Prospect Park to Vanderbilt Avenue<\/a>, where traffic is regularly banned during the summer as part of the city\u2019s \u201cOpen Streets\u201d program.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"eegn6\">Officials under Adams later advanced two proposals to local community boards \u2014 and Mamdani on Monday said he would move ahead with the more ambitious of the two options.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"5ofhg\">\u201cAnyone who\u2019s tried to cross here knows how dangerous and chaotic the streets can be,\u201d Mamdani said in a statement. \u201cThis redesign is long overdue and will provide a sense of ease and enjoyment to one of Brooklyn\u2019s most important public spaces.\u201d<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"b492s\">The redesign would reduce the number of places at Grand Army Plaza where pedestrians and motorists interact from 31 to 20, officials said.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"b489q\">Morgan Monaco, president of the nonprofit Prospect Park Alliance, said she\u2019s looking forward to the expansion of the park\u2019s footprint.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"cla1a\">\u201cWhen you come into the park and you kind of go under the arch, you&#8217;re transformed into a green oasis,\u201d she said. \u201cThis would help bring that sense of calm even further out.\u201d<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"d73r4\">The transportation department plans to begin holding workshops on the plan later this month. The workshops add to decades of surveys and town halls held by city officials to seek feedback on proposals to redesign Grand Army Plaza.<\/p>\n<p data-block-key=\"t0dm\">The announcement marks a plan to return to the original design for Grand Army Plaza, which envisioned the arch as a grand entrance to Prospect Park. The city formally banned car traffic from the park in 2018.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The city transportation department plans to ban cars from the southern edge of Grand Army Plaza in a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":195662,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,9,24,63],"class_list":["post-195661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/195661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=195661"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/195661\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/195662"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=195661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=195661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=195661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}