Residents along South Oyster Bay Road are hoping the thoroughfare’s designation as an access highway will soon hit a dead end.
Town of Oyster Bay officials will hold a two-part public hearings regarding the truck traffic at town hall in Oyster Bay at 10 a.m. and 7 p.m. on Nov. 10. The hearings will focus on the implementation of weight and height restrictions for oversized trucks traveling through Plainview, Hicksville, Syosset and Bethpage on South Oyster Bay Road.
Supervisor John Venditto said the town could vote that night to restrict truck access on the road—this could force the state’s hand to change the designation and reimpose the 48-foot truck length limit.
“The state holds the keys here,” he said. “With a snap of the finger, the state can straighten it out. We are in the process of framing new legislation to control this from the town’s perspective.”
Last December, the New York State Department of Transportation (DOT) quietly designated a four-mile stretch of South Oyster Bay Road as an access highway for tractor trailers ranging from 53 to 75 feet in length. FedEx submitted an application to the DOT to request this designation to accommodate truck-based transport of freight from the Long Island Expressway to its facility near Grumman in Bethpage. According to the DOT, town and Nassau County officials both received the request, but neither objected or requested a legal public hearing.
Venditto said regardless of how this designation passed without push back, now is the time to fix the problem.
“We’re wasting time playing the blame game right now,” he said. “The town says [they] oppose it, the county opposes it—it doesn’t matter what happened with the letters and how it was designated in the first place. The town, county and state need to get everyone in the same room and around the same table and if everyone is there with the best interest of the residents at heart, this can be resolved. And it will be resolved.”
A spokesperson for the state DOT said that it is currently in discussion with the town and county regarding the road designation.
“NYSDOT completed a thorough safety review using Federal Highway Administration guidelines and solicited comments and feedback from the town and county,” said Gary Holmes, DOT director of communications. “With no objections, the designation was approved. Nine months after the designation went into effect we received the first notice of concern from local officials and we have been in discussion since.”
Although South Oyster Bay Road is under the jurisdiction of the county, Councilwoman Rebecca Alesia said that the New York Vehicle and Traffic Law provides the town with the authority to exclude “trucks…tractors, tractor-trailer combinations, or tractor-trailer-semitrailer combinations in excess of any designated weight, designated length, [or] designated height” on its roadways.
“Residents who live on or near the roadway have expressed concern over the increased presence of oversized tractor trailers,” said Alesia. “The Town of Oyster Bay, together with our colleagues in county government, has requested that this designation be rescinded. In the meantime, the town is looking to modify its traffic code to prohibit these special dimension vehicles from traveling a portion of South Oyster Bay Road.”
Many residents plan on attending the Nov. 10 hearing to not only hear from town officials, but also to let their own voices be heard. One of those residents, Scott Graham, who has lived along South Oyster Bay Road in Plainview for close to 30 years, said that he hopes the town and county can work with the state to get the trucks off of South Oyster
Bay Road.
“The fact that they [town and county] didn’t stop this from happening is worrisome,” he said. “But generally I feel like they do care about the safety of the residents so I’m hopeful this will be fixed sooner rather than later.”
