Feds announce $150 million for new bus, pedestrian and cyclist lanes on the Cross Bronx

Commuters drive the Cross Bronx Expressway on Friday, Sept. 8, 2023.

Photo Camille Botello

New dedicated bus lanes and both pedestrian and cyclist pathways are on the horizon for the Cross Bronx Expressway thanks to a $150 million allocation from the federal Department of Transportation (DOT) — the latest step in the reimagining of the freeway to improve both transportation and health outcomes in the borough. 

Sens. Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, along with U.S. Rep. Ritchie Torres, announced a community connector roadway project for the Cross Bronx project on Dec. 18 which includes the new bus lanes and pathways. It’s also a “critical component” of the state DOT’s project to rehabilitate and replace five Cross Bronx bridges, according to Schumer’s office. The project is estimated to cost a total of $258 million.  

“When you look at the Cross Bronx Expressway, you see the massive lanes, the cars, the pollution and the disconnect,” Schumer said. “That’s why, under the Biden Administration, we finally had the chance to right some of the infrastructure wrongs of the past, both in terms of pollution and traffic flow in the Bronx.”

As far as infrastructure in the borough goes, the Cross Bronx has been toward the top of the docket for many local politicians. 

The Cross Bronx Expressway was started by the famed urban planner Robert Moses in 1948, and has long been criticized as a project rooted in environmental racism. The highway divides the borough in half and originally displaced entire neighborhoods — many of which were predominantly Black, brown, Jewish and immigrant communities — in the process. 

Its impact is seen in the daily lives of residents to this day. The Cross Bronx has left communities of color in the South Bronx especially with disproportionately high asthma rates. 

A year ago this week, New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced a $2 million grant his administration would use to reassess…