Traffic Frustration Boils Over In Mastic-Shirley

Years of frustration over worsening traffic congestion in Mastic-Shirley boiled over at a civic meeting where local officials and residents called for state action to provide more ways on and off the Mastic Peninsula.

“Horrendous, dangerous, intolerable” were some of the words residents used to describe the conditions they face every day. By the end of the Manor Park Civic Association meeting, the message was clear: A community of tens of thousands of residents needs more than two primary routes across the Long Island Rail Road tracks.

“We’ve talked to them until we were blue in the face,” Sen. Dean Murray told the crowd, noting that he has raised the issue with three different Long Island Rail Road presidents. “They simply will not allow any more grade crossings.”

Local officials at the meeting — Assemblyman Joe DeStefano, Brookhaven Supervisor Dan Panico, Highway Superintendent Dan Losquadro and Councilwoman Karen Dunne-Kesnig — said crossings at Madison Street and Hawthorne Street could serve as major relief valves for daily traffic.

“The gates go down, the lights start flashing, the gates go up and you go. Everyone is aware of the risk,” Panico said, noting that a crossing would cost about $1 million. The relatively small-scale projects are dwarfed by the long-term goal of routing William Floyd Parkway under the tracks.

“The grade crossings would be a tremendous relief and we need to keep the pressure on the governor and the MTA to get this done,” DeStefano said. “Not having more ways in and out causes huge problems and the state just won’t budge.”

Losquadro agreed, giving residents Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office number, 518-474-8390. “I’ve been here for 13 and a half years and we’re still talking about this,” he said. “The MTA has been obstinate; at every turn the answer is no.”

Residents and Manor Park Civic Association President John Sicignano also put forward a broader package of traffic improvements, ranging from relatively modest changes to major highway projects.

Among them are retiming traffic signals on Mastic Road, widening the Mastic Road railroad crossing and adding merging lanes in both directions.

Residents also called for direct access from the north service road to westbound Sunrise Highway, eliminating the need for motorists to travel to William Floyd Parkway to enter the highway, along with a dedicated merging lane for right turns from the north service road onto William Floyd Parkway.

Larger proposals include widening William Floyd Parkway to three lanes in each direction, creating a Sunrise Highway exit at Barnes Road and making Sunrise Highway three lanes from Route 112 to Wading River Road, an improvement local officials publicly pushed at a rally the previous day.

The area’s fate was sealed in 1984 when a local legislator, acting at the behest of nearby property owners, voted against a plan to build a William Floyd Parkway bridge over Montauk Highway. Residents have been dealing with the consequences ever since.