Business owners in Hoboken are questioning whether a major infrastructure project designed to reduce flooding is doing what it was intended to do after Saturday\u2019s storms left parts of Madison Street underwater.<\/p>\n
\u201cMadison Street is the lowest point in Hoboken. So all the water comes here,\u201d said Jefe Maruflu, owner of Jefferson Coffee Shop.<\/p>\n
Maruflu says floodwaters came dangerously close to entering his business after just a few hours of rain.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was coming right to our door. And this is only two, three hours of raining and we\u2019re in the dry season. It\u2019s July and it\u2019s summer. Imagine this happening in September and October, which is really the hurricane season,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The flooding comes after years of construction along Madison Street aimed at addressing chronic flooding issues in Northwest Hoboken. <\/p>\n
The project, a partnership between the City of Hoboken and the North Hudson Sewerage Authority, includes replacing sewers and stormwater inlets, elevating portions of roadways, curbs and sidewalks, and upgrading water mains between 9th and 11th streets. The improvements are intended to direct rainfall into the sewer system and mitigate recurring flooding in the area. <\/p>\n
The project was split into two phases after engineers identified conflicts with underground electrical infrastructure. Phase 1, which included electrical work near 10th Street, was completed in 2023. Phase 2 broke ground in the fall of 2024 and includes the sewer and roadway improvements. <\/p>\n
However, Maruflu says Saturday\u2019s flooding left him disappointed.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe outcome we were expecting was great \u2014 no more flooding again. But it didn\u2019t happen that way,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He says construction has already taken a financial toll on his business, cutting foot traffic in half during the work. Now, he worries flooding continues to discourage customers.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t see any change. All this major infrastructure project investment, almost like $5 million, hasn\u2019t produced any result,\u201d Maruflu said.<\/p>\n
Maruflu is now hoping city officials will inspect the completed work and determine whether additional improvements are needed.<\/p>\n
The City of Hoboken has not yet responded to News 12\u2019s request for comment on Saturday\u2019s flooding.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Business owners in Hoboken are questioning whether a major infrastructure project designed to reduce flooding is doing what…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":300420,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[75,84,83,9,24,63],"class_list":["post-300419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-manhattan","tag-manhattan","tag-manhattan-headlines","tag-manhattan-news","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300419","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=300419"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300419\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/300420"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=300419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=300419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=300419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}