NYC Brooklyn I-278 bound - to/from Red Hook cruise terminal, weekend traffic gridlock alert, continuing

[mking8288]

Last weekend, BQE or I-278 around Brooklyn Heights, had full closure Manhattan bound and only 1 lane open heading toward south Brooklyn, Staten Island & Red Hook's Bklyn Cruise Terminal.  Major reconstruction and work will continue on weekends until ... expect and plan for delays, detours and allow plenty of extra times to get around, to/from there.  If possible, use the Battery Tunnel (tolled) from/to Lower Manhattan as the best by-pass.  Commercial & truck traffic that must get thru and around were on city streets, traffic agents out in full force - conditions were somewhat better on Sunday.  Safe travel - NYC Marathon coming up soon ...

https://brooklyneagle.com/articles/2023/10/16/first-weekend-closure-of-bqe-brings-packed-roads-lots-of-traffic-agents-to-brooklyn/?fbclid=IwAR1I73ZKyEd-8JB1WxNfSvORsrww47I-qvRniA0jxveuhuwCldnwuOdch_M 

 

Safe travel and watch out for speed cameras, city's speed limit is 25 MPH or less. 

[GTJ]

5 hours ago, mking8288 said:

Last weekend, BQE or I-278 around Brooklyn Heights, had full closure Manhattan bound . . . .

I think you meant to say that the closure was in effect Queen-bound, not Manhattan-bound. This confused me initially because the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway does go towards Manhattan. (The Gowanus Expressway, which carries I-278 south of Caroll Gardens, does go towards Manhattan, but it does not go around Brooklyn Heights.)

 

5 hours ago, mking8288 said:

If possible, use the Battery Tunnel (tolled) from/to Lower Manhattan as the best by-pass.

The Hugh L. Carey Tunnel (a.k.a. Brooklyn–Battery Tunnel) is not a particularly attractive alternative. Motorists coming from Queens would have to enter Manhattan, paying a toll to use the Queens–Midtown Tunnel, negotiate Manhattan traffic, and then leave Manhattan, paying a second toll to use the Hugh L. Carey Tunnel.  On the other hand, I don't think that there is any "good" by-pass, and at best one can only mitigate the disruption (perhaps by using the Van Wyck Expressway to the Belt Parkway, and going the long way around?).

 

5 hours ago, mking8288 said:

Safe travel and watch out for speed cameras, city's speed limit is 25 MPH or less. 

The default speed limit is 25 miles per hour, but this is overridden by posted signs, both upward and downward. Neighborhood slow zones reduce the speed limit to 20 miles per hour; on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway the speed limit is 45 miles per hour. Do watch for signs to ascertain the proper limit, but if there are no signs then abide by the default speed limit.