Big boost: Buffalo's Big Picture plan, Kensington, and Scajacquada concepts get DC support
Senate bill would target highways that divided, destroyed neighborhoods
For those who have worked for decades to remove barriers to the Buffalo waterfront, downgrade the Scajaquada Expressway, and mitigate the Kensington Expressway, help is on the way. The Campaign for Greater Buffalo's Big Picture Plan, released last week (it includes the Cloudwalk, released separately in February) is in the wheelhouse of a proposed "reconnecting Communities Act," which targets "infrastructural barriers that create to mobility or economic development, or expose the community to air pollution or other health and safety risks.” The Big Picture seeks to do all of those things, in addition to building new workforce housing, parks, and canals to support downtown retail and public transportation, as well historic preservation. View and download Big Picture plan
The Washington Post reports "Key Democratic senators are introducing legislation to reconnect neighborhoods cut off by the Interstate Highway System. The “Reconnecting Communities Act” is aimed redressing some of the historic inequities and racial disparities in the federal government's transportation investments.
"The legislation mirrors the $20 billion fund to take down highways outlined in President Biden's infrastructure proposal: it calls for the same levels of funding to be distributed through a grant program that would live in the Department of Transportation, according to an advance copy of the bill.
"The undertaking is also intended to alleviate traffic-related pollution — a continuation of the Biden administration's push to address environmental justice."