• New York State DOT picks ‘Community Grid’ in Syracuse

    Since 2008, CNU has highlighted the advantages of transforming the elevated I-81 through the heart of the city.
    New York State DOT has selected the “Community Grid” as the preferred alternative for Interstate 81 in Syracuse, a plan that would allow the elevated viaduct that has severed city neighborhoods since the 1950s to revert to a grid of streets. I-81 leveled African-American and ethnic neighborhoods,...Read more

  • Time to restore the grid

    A costly freeway, feeding a shopping mall, is a poor foundation for a mid-sized city—a better choice is to invest in infrastructure that supports downtown and surrounding neighborhoods.
    I-81 in Syracuse is more personal, to me, than the other nine projects in CNU’s Freeways Without Futures 2019 report. I live about an hour from Syracuse in the small Upstate New York City of Ithaca. New York cities have been devastated by freeways. The state had a wealth of industrial cities in the...Read more