UES residents accuse MTA of withholding Second Avenue Subway-related testing results

Residents of townhouses in the Treadwell Farms Historic District of Manhattan, which spans Second to Third avenues from 63rd to 60th streets, are growing frustrated because of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s lack of response to their complaints about ongoing underground blasting for the Second Avenue Subway.

According to NY1, the MTA finally installed vibration monitoring devices on some of the homes in the district after complaints of structural damage, but it is now allegedly refusing to share results from the testing with residents.

The MTA said that the blasting is below levels declared safe by the Department of Buildings and that data will be given to the homeowners in due course.

“What if something fell off a wall, something fell on a child,” said resident Julianne Bertagna. “I know there have been people in the neighborhood who have said that light fixtures have fallen out of the ceilings or lamps have fallen off their walls.”

With historic homes, there’s an added danger in threatening the buildings structurally, said the homeowners’ attorney Arthur Goldstein.

“When you’re dealing with historic homes, if damage is too extensive an insurance check is not necessarily going to replace history,” he said. “We just don’t know how extensive the damage will be with another two months at levels of blasting that are just too high.” [NY1]