Mayor Zohran Mamdani: Good afternoon, everyone. It is a privilege to be back in Greenpoint with so many friends and partners who I have mourned alongside, marched alongside, and vowed to improve McGuinness Boulevard alongside. I am grateful to the elected officials who have carried this effort forward. And I am especially thankful to the community members who have never given up on the hope that a people united and organized can both demand and deliver the change that they know is necessary. My friends, because of you, we will complete the redesign of McGuinness Boulevard.
Before we speak of what the future will hold, I want to speak of the past that we all endured to arrive at this day. As trucks and cars fly by at high speed, I am reminded of the words of the man who thought a four-lane highway was worth destroying homes, displacing residents, and scarring this neighborhood.
Robert Moses said, “When you operate in an overbuilt metropolis, you have to hack your way with a meat axe.” There are few places in this city where that axe was sharper, or where the hacking left such deep injury. Since three-year-old Jimmy Battaglia died here in 1956, the first casualty of McGuinness, some estimates say that more than 200 New Yorkers have been killed on this asphalt.
To this day, countless Greenpointers still mourn Matthew Jensen, who we will mark five years without in May. The students he taught, the parents who adored him, the community that cherished him. I want to recognize his cousin John, who is here today, who was at the very first Make McGuinness Safe ally and has helped this community take its pain and turn it into purpose. Thank you, John.
The consequences of Moses' axe have been measured in the human toll that this four-way highway has incurred, and in so many other unseen but deeply insidious ways.
It is felt when parents don't feel safe letting their children out of the house to play. It is felt when cyclists go on long detours, because McGuinness is simply too dangerous to take the risk. It is felt when people dread going to the grocery store, or getting a cup of coffee, or just going on an afternoon walk, because they fear that they will have to cross the street.
For too long, those in power have ignored Greenpointers' calls for help. As a result, what was understood solely as a road became something much larger, an embodiment of political choices, a physical piece of evidence of city government that listened to the well-connected at the expense of working people.
But thanks to parents, neighbors, and Assemblymember Emily Gallagher, the city committed to a redesign of McGuinness Boulevard. That commitment promised to deliver the safety and improvements that residents had been asking for, until the prior administration bowed to big-money interests, leaving the project incomplete and Greenpointers still at risk. Today, however, there is a new mayor in City Hall.
I am so proud to have stood with this community, and I am even prouder to be able to use the power of City Hall to deliver a better, safer future for the people of Greenpoint. My commissioner, Mike Flynn, will lead the DOT in installing parking-protected bike lanes along the length of the entirety of McGuinness Boulevard from Meeker Avenue to the Pulaski Bridge.
Once the project has been completed, there will be one travel lane in each direction, one parking-protected bike lane in each direction, and one vehicular parking and loading lane in each direction. We will begin this process as soon as the weather warms. Many of the materials required for this kind of work cannot be used when the ground is wet or when temperatures are below 40 degrees.
And while this is just the beginning of our work to deliver street safety across this city for pedestrians, for cyclists, and every person who calls the city home, I want to remind New Yorkers that none of this was inevitable.
A little over four months ago, I stood with many of the same people I see today after walking up McGuinness. I stood with this very pin that was given to me by those New Yorkers. Many had known Matthew Jensen. Many had dedicated years to asking for change, for attention, for empathy from politicians who couldn't even bother to care.
Standing together on that hot August day, we felt like we were on the cusp of real improvement, of actually achieving what we had set out to do. Thanks to so many who went out and pounded the pavement, that pavement now will change. If today is nothing else, it is a celebration of a city created by all who live in it. Thank you all very much, and please welcome Bronwyn Breitner.
Bronwyn Breitner, Coordinator, Make McGuinness Safe: Thank you, Mayor Mamdani. Thank you so much. My name is Bronwyn Breitner. I'm a 21-year resident of North Brooklyn, a local small business owner, and my husband and I have chosen to raise our two boys here in Greenpoint.
When my son Kai was two years old, his brand-new red bicycle was stolen from in front of our house. We posted flyers on the poles around our block in hopes that our neighbors would help us in our search to find it. And guess what? They did.
When my son Kai was nine years old, his teacher, Matt Jensen, was killed crossing McGuinness Boulevard on foot, one block from our home. And after decades of serious injuries and deaths on McGuinness Boulevard, after a decade of holding Kai and Ellery's hands tighter when I crossed that street, we asked our neighbors for help again.
We asked them to support a movement to ask the city for a comprehensive redesign of McGuinness Boulevard that would last forever. And they did, again. With the support of Lincoln, and Emily, and Kristen, and Antonio, and Julia, and Nydia, and thousands of neighbors and a hundred local businesses and community organizations, we fought for five years, and we won a plan from the DOT in 2023 when Kai was nine.
The DOT committed to transform this boulevard into a safe and livable street for Greenpoint. But that same year, the Adams administration killed the plan. And Kai learned firsthand what corruption looks like. But today is Kai's 14th birthday.
And today we celebrate a new era for McGuinness Boulevard. We celebrate a new era for Greenpoint. We celebrate a new era with a mayor in power who teaches our students and our children what true, honest leadership that centers the community, livability, and affordability of New York City in his campaign.
We are so grateful to you, Mayor Mamdani, for making this a priority in your campaign, for keeping your promise that you made to our community many months ago, and we are so thrilled to partner with you on this today and in the work that this involves in the future. Thank you so much.
Mayor Mamdani: And now our DOT commissioner, Mike Flynn.
Commissioner Mike Flynn, Department of Transportation: When your public agency has fans, that's a good sign. Well, thank you, Mayor Mamdani, and I would echo the gratitude to all the advocates and elected officials for keeping this project on the front burner over all those years.
It is a new era for New York City and a new era for New York City DOT. We said we would hit the ground running and that's exactly why we're at McGuinness Boulevard on just the third day of this new administration.
For far too long, a critical street safety redesign developed by committed public servants at DOT was set aside, even though the need was clear and the planning work was done. As soon as the weather warms, we'll deliver the original safety plan for McGuinness Boulevard, as the mayor said, installing parking protected bike lanes from Meeker Avenue all the way to the Pulaski Bridge.
McGuinness Boulevard should stitch Greenpoint together, not divide it in half. These upgrades will make it safer and easier for children and parents to cross the street. They'll protect cyclists, reduce reckless driving, and transform what can feel like a highway into a calmer neighborhood street. And this is just the beginning. DOT will advance bold, ambitious ideas to keep New Yorkers safe on streets across the city. Let's get to work.
New York State Assemblywoman Emily Gallagher: First, I would like to ask cousin John Ogren to come up to the front. I am Assemblymember Emily Gallagher, and I am so proud that I get to serve this community that raised me as an activist, and that I get to have an amazing mayor serve with me in creating an even more amazing community going forward.
I became passionate about politics because I was passionate about this community. And I learned that we so often face infrastructure and face decisions that feel as if they were created by God, feel as if we cannot actually change anything, but the reality is that everything can be changed. And that we have for decades been trapped in a system that prioritized wealth and personal gain, over community and a vision of the future.
And I am so proud of Mayor Mamdani because he is really talking about a new era, and that is what we have been hungering for in government and politics. We have so many ideas around the world that work, that create safety, create community, create stability for everyone. And street design is one of those very creative fields that has been kneecapped by inflexible and uncreative politicians at the helm.
And I am thrilled that we now have a mayor who is excited about being creative, about listening, and about connecting with each and every one of us. Because he knows and I know that this city is not its streets and its buildings, it is the people who live within it.
And unlike the politics of the past, which thinks that the people are replaceable, and the neighborhoods and the wealth and the land value are not, we know that it is the opposite. We can actually build a sustainable, beautiful city that serves each and every one of us, that creates a stability so that we can be together here, we can walk hand in hand down the road, we can hang out on the corner, we can ride our bikes together, we can teach our children to ride bikes with us, and we can do that together here in this city.
We don't have to leave this city to have [a] wonderful community. Community is born in New York, and it will stay here because we have Mayor Mamdani. So, I want to thank each and every one of you who showed up on every single one of these campaigns, who knocked doors to get people elected, who stood in the center of town, handing out flyers about ideas that you had like a redesigned McGuinness Boulevard that you believed in. And you knew that it was actually people to people that made the difference, not donor to donor.
And at the end of the day, it is you all that I am here for, and it is you all that I believe in. And I believe that together, if we continue to fight for a politics that centers each other, and we stay involved in this kind of connectivity, we will lead the way in the world. A world that is full of wonderful ideas ready for the taking.
So, thank you so much mayor and thank you to the activists who stood by my side through so many decades of work on this. I'm so excited that there are people here who I worked on this with in 2010, in 2020 and now in 2026. And all of the people who have lost people to this selfish view of what a street can be and what a street is for.
Streets are for people, and we are the people who will shape and define them in the years to come. So, thank you and thank you everyone. And now I'm going to pass it to one of my dearest, dearest friends, a lifelong advocate himself, Councilmember Lincoln Restler.
John Ogren: I promise too that cousin Maddie would be standing right here with you, and I really believe that Maddie is up here with the choir, watching all of us. So, God bless you. I'm so proud that you're my mayor. Thank you for all you do.
Councilmember Lincoln Restler: Thank you cousin John, and can we give it up one more time for our amazing Assemblymember Emily Gallagher. Greenpoint, we freaking did it.
Look, over these last few years, across the five boroughs, McGuinness Boulevard had become synonymous with a City Hall that put politics over people. That put corporate donors over our community. That put Hulu special guest appearances over our damn safety.
But Greenpoint, we organized like []. We got 10,000 neighbors to sign on to our petition to demand that McGuinness finally become safe. Every single elected official had this community's back. Antonio, our borough president, Nydia, our congresswoman, Kristen, our state senator, and Emily Gallagher for more years than I can count, have been fighting for a safe McGuinness Boulevard.
And when we implemented a fraction of the plan, the opposition told us that the apocalypse would arrive. That's what they said. But you know traffic on McGuinness Boulevard has gone up about a minute in each direction? That traffic volumes across the neighborhood have only increased in the most modest of ways?
Our neighborhood is demonstrably safer already because of the changes that we have secured on McGuinness Boulevard. But McGuinness Boulevard will finally be safe from the Pulaski Bridge down to Meeker because of the leadership of Mayor Zohran Mamdani.
He was the first candidate for mayor to sign the pledge to make McGuinness safe. He showed up here in the general election to stand with all of us to say this was a priority, and in week one of this administration, Zohran Mamdani is making McGuinness safe once and for all.
And this is just the beginning. Because the safety improvements that we're going to see here on McGuinness Boulevard are going to be happening in every single neighborhood across the five boroughs. We are finally going to make our streets safe for all of us, because we have a mayor who finally has our back.
And I just want to say, from the bottom of my heart, thank you. Thank you to every single person who is here today and who has organized over these last few years to make McGuinness safe. It's because of you, it's because of the ways that you showed up at City Hall, that you showed up at the town hall meetings, that you showed up at the community boards, that you gathered petition signatures in the freezing cold at farmers markets and on street corners.
It's because of your hard work that McGuinness became the street safety project across the City of New York. And it's because of your hard work that Zohran’s getting it done [on] day one. Let’s make it happen. Thank you all.
New York State Senator Kristen Gonzalez: Alright, hi, Greenpoint. How are we feeling today? It is such an honor to be here with all of you. My name is Kristen Gonzalez, and I am the state senator that represents this area.
I want to start with an immense thank you to every single organizer and activist and the Make McGuinness Safe Coalition that got us to this point. Can we give them a huge round of applause? Bronwyn and Kevin and every single person that, as you heard, signed a petition, that showed up on the cold and hard days. This win is all of yours.
I want to thank the elected officials behind me, Assemblymember Gallagher and Councilmember Restler, for their years of tireless work alongside our Borough President Antonio Reynoso and our congresswomen as well. And of course, I want to give a sincere and heartfelt thank you to our new mayor, Zohran Mamdani, for making this a week one priority.
I think the story of McGuinness Boulevard matters to every single person in this city. Because it shows and has represented some of the best of us, and some of what the best of what the city has to offer, against the worst that sometimes the city has to offer.
On one side, we had a coalition of everyday New Yorkers who dared to dream bigger for this boulevard, who dared to go up against establishments to demand better. We had elected officials who were ready to stand alongside them. We had years of research and data that showed that a road diet and a redesign would save lives. And on the other side, we had corrupt administrations, we had bribes given and taken. We had businesses more interested in putting their profit before the safety of all of us.
Today, we have proven that David can beat Goliath. Today, we have proven for every single New Yorker that when we organize, we can win bigger and better for all of us. And that this is just the beginning. Because as you've heard today, this is a new era for our city, a new era for Greenpoint.
But there is still so much work ahead. I know there will be capital improvements that will not only see the full redesign and road diet but really be invested in this boulevard for all this community has imagined. I know and I am confident that now that we have won here, as someone who represents three boroughs and who in 2022 when I ran for office, McGuinness was the first issue we talked about – that this will be the model for the rest of this city.
So, thank you again for being here. Thank you to every New Yorker for tuning in. And thank you to our incredible Mayor Zohran Mamdani for being the leader on that. And I look forward to getting the work done together. Thank you all so much.
Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso: Good afternoon. So, my name is Antonio Reynoso and I'm the president of one of the two greatest boroughs in the City of New York. I have to say that because Zohran’s from Queens and I gotta show some love and respect.
I want to keep this short. I just want to say thank you and that we never have to say thank you again. Because we shouldn't have to fight this hard for practical things like this. It is unbelievable that this amount of organizing, that every single elected official outside of the mayor in that time, supported this project and it still can't get through.
And you get five angry people in some faraway portion of an outer borough fighting for parking, and it always happens. And in this case, this massing doesn't make a difference.
But now we have Mayor Zohran Mamdani. and that's what makes the difference. It is an elected official that understands that people over politics is what matters. People like Emily Gallagher, all these resources, all this time that she had to expend to get something that is so practical done is unnecessary. This will be the last time.
And I say this to Emily, because Emily, we need you doing other work now. Emily, I want to say, I like to quote famous poets from great boroughs, and this one is going to be a little different, because this is Emily's baby, and there's a great poet by the name of Nas that said, “If I rule the world, imagine that I free all my sons and love them, love them baby.” And McGuinness is getting the love today.
Fabiola Mendieta-Cuapio, Co-Chair, Families for Safe Street New York: My name is Fabiola Mendieta-Cuapio, and I'm the co-chair of Families for Safe Streets of New York. And as a mother who lost my son, I'm deeply grateful to see Mayor Mamdani announce his intention to complete the full redesign of McGuinness Boulevard.
We were shocked and appealed when the original plan was watered down in 2023 over play-to-play politics. So many people like beloved P.S. 110 teacher Matthew Jensen have lost their lives on this dangerous speedway. For years, Families for Safe Streets has stood with the Greenpoint community, demanding more.
And we're so glad McGuinness is finally going to get the full safety redesign it sorely needs. McGuinness today, [inaudible] across the five boroughs tomorrow. Thank you.
Mayor Mamdani: Just before we begin questions, I would like to invite everyone who has lost a loved one to please join me here at the lectern. You can come down.
I want to make clear to New Yorkers that we are not speaking in the abstract. We are speaking about New Yorkers whose lives have been torn apart by inaction for far too long. And the New Yorkers you see alongside me are those who have lost the very people that they built their lives around.
And sometimes you may not even know those in your life have been affected by this. This is a photo I was just given of me in high school, standing alongside a friend and a leader of our then soccer team, Asher Kelly Knott. It was given to me by his mother, who is here with us. I did not know then what I know now, which is that Asher's father was killed while riding a bicycle by a reckless driver.
And I say this, because too often in our city, in our politics, we lose sight of what this actually means in people's lives. We start to understand these stories as if they are purely statistics. We start to think of traffic violence as something that can be measured in numbers year after year.
We forget that this inaction has forced the very New Yorkers who have felt the brunt of this violence to traumatize themselves day after day, telling elected officials about the worst moment in their life. And today we are here not just to announce that we will complete this redesign, but also to announce that those days have to come to an end.
That instead, what we must do now is build for a new future. One that understands safety as something that is paramount, not as something that has to be negotiated. One that understands the worth of its people, the worth of this place. It all, as the assemblymember said, comes back to the New Yorkers that are around us today and around us each and every day across the five boroughs.
So, to these families, to these New Yorkers, I am so sorry that we could not have done this earlier, years and decades ago, to have saved the loved ones in your life. But I thank you for the work that you have done to ensure that we can save those New Yorkers today, tomorrow, the weeks, the months, the years to come, to ensure that this pain [will] not be felt by others who call the same city home. Thank you so much.
Question: Mayor, I don't know if you remember, during the campaign one of the local newspapers said electing you would be electing de Blasio on steroids. This plan, however, is obviously the de Blasio plan, and some people who are standing with you today are also calling for the steroids part. Bike lanes on Driggs, and the parallel streets of the K Bridge, low traffic neighborhood, and the rat running. So, what do you do for an encore on this one?
Mayor Mamdani: Well, I think I would make clear that today is not and will not be the extent of the work that we will do to make this city safe. We will make it safe for pedestrians, for cyclists, for drivers, for New Yorkers across the five boroughs. And I say that as someone who has at different points in my life been [a] different one of those things. And too often I have felt that my safety is in question depending on what street that I'm on.
I live on 35th Street in Astoria. I would bike to 32nd and 24th Avenue. I had two options, and I would always take the option, not the one that was most convenient, but the one that was safest. That kind of decision making has to come to an end.
And I'm excited, frankly, in having our commissioner here alongside me. Because when I was interviewing him, we did not simply ask him about fulfilling that which has already been put forward. We asked him, “What will it take to make this city the envy of the world when it comes to our streetscape and our public transit?” These are the questions that we are asking, and soon we will have the answers to those questions to deliver on that. Thank you to Streetsblog.
Question: I'm wondering because I think this will start in the spring. Do you have an actual date or month that this will start?
Commissioner Flynn: It's really dependent on our partner Mother Nature. So, we basically need the temperatures to get above a certain level and we need dry conditions. Hopefully, that's late April. Usually it's May, but it's as soon as we can basically. But it just has to be physically doable.
Mayor Mamdani: And I will just say, as someone who has been on the other side of DOT for many years, we actually mean this. And the point of announcing this today is also to ensure that we do the legwork necessary, so that when the weather is amenable to this construction, we are able to hit the ground running. This means that the policy designs that need to be finalized can start to be commenced at DOT. This also means that we can notify the community board in advance of that construction taking place. I know you had another question.
Question: I know you said in a statement earlier today that you had been briefed on the situation with Maduro in Venezuela, who is soon to be in New York. Were you briefed by the president? Have you spoken to the president about this matter?
Mayor Mamdani: I was briefed by my first deputy mayor, my chief of staff, my chief counsel, the police commissioner, as well as other members of my team. I called the president and spoke with him directly to register my opposition to this act, and to make clear that it was an opposition based on being opposed to a pursuit of regime change, to the violation of federal international law, and a desire to see that be consistent each and every day. I registered my opposition. I made it clear, and we left it at that.
Question: I wanted to get your response to the reporting from Ken Klippenstein who said in your second executive order, your restructuring of your office indicated you were not going to meet with Commissioner Tisch every day and said she was going to report to a deputy mayor and that sort of suggested that you had downgraded her. Can you speak to that restructuring at all and [get] some clarity there?
Mayor Mamdani: I am in constant communication with Commissioner Tisch, whether it be today or any other day, and the commissioner within the structure of our City Hall will be reporting to our first deputy mayor, Dean Fuleihan. That, however, does not preclude conversations from taking place with me. And at the heart of that is because of the fact that public safety is the cornerstone of our affordability agenda. And today is also an announcement of that public safety and delivering it to New Yorkers.
Question: So was that a downgrade, yes or no?
Mayor Mamdani: That was just a reflection of the structure of City Hall.
Question: In your conversation with President Trump, are you worried that registering opposition will change the relationship that you have with him? And have you gotten any information about bringing [Maduro] into New York today or in the coming days?
Mayor Mamdani: My administration will continue to monitor the developments in this situation and will also be sure to share anything relevant with New Yorkers. The president and I have always been honest and direct with each other about places of disagreement.
I was honest and direct in the Oval Office. I will be honest and direct in the phone conversations we have, and New Yorkers have elected me to be honest and direct and always to do so with the understanding that my job is to deliver for the people who call the city home. And my job is to keep them safe and to ensure that they can actually afford to keep calling the city home.
Question: So, we've been saying this a lot for years, that it's not enough to do one intersection, right? I think I’ve heard you say that countless times, and now you're in a position to actually do that. So, about universal daylighting, you have the power now to simply do it. We don't need a council bill. So, will you promise the people of New York and the people of this coalition that this is something we can actually do, every intersection?
Mayor Mamdani: We are going to be pursuing every single safety measure that can deliver that for New Yorkers. And I am telling you that when I selected my commissioner, we spoke about what actual safety means. When I was elected to the assembly, before I took office, I saw what inaction looked like. When I organized with fellow elected officials, we sent a letter to DOT asking for physical infrastructure improvements to be made on the Crescent Street bike lane. I was told we could not expect that to take place.
Soon after, Alfredo Cabrera Liconia was killed at one of those exact intersections. And the point that we had made in a letter was then a point that was made to New Yorkers, which is that we need to actually keep people safe, and the infrastructure does so. And I saw in my own district, too often daylighting is something that is delivered after someone is killed.
We cannot allow for the story that happened to Dolma to happen again and again in order to see daylighting on an intersection. And so, that is the work that we are going to be doing with my commissioner, not just in thinking about one specific proposal, but frankly, how can we extend this to the work that we do across the city.
Question: Could you talk to the Venezuelan New Yorkers who came here to flee the regime, and secondly, are you concerned with Maduro being out here and everything?
Mayor Mamdani: There are tens of thousands of Venezuelans who call the city home. Their safety is critically important to me, as is the safety of each and every New Yorker, and my job is to deliver for them. And we are also going to be making clear that if they are in need of assistance at this time, how they can interact with the city government, so that we can meet those needs, both in the immediate and the medium term. And we are going to make certain that for New Yorkers, we limit any of the impact on their day-to-day life that will come as a consequence of the actions the federal government has taken.
Question: Maduro, apparently, he's going to be brought to New York City to face charges. Did you speak about that with the president? Is there anything that you plan to do or can do around his potential detention here in New York, or is that a federal issue that's out of your purview?
Mayor Mamdani: As the mayor of New York City, it is my responsibility to ensure that whatever the actions the federal government takes, that they have a minimal impact on the day-to-day lives of New Yorkers. And so that will be a focus of my administration moving forward.
Question: On the executive orders that caused some–over the weekend. Can you explain to us when you made the decision to rescind the orders that you did, particularly as it relates to the definition of antisemitism from the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, and the Anti-BDS statute that the mayor had put in place.
Did you always know you were going to roll those back? Why did you not publicly announce it or put out a press release saying so? Did you not want people to realize you were doing that?
Mayor Mamdani: On the first day as the mayor of New York City, you have to make the decision of which prior executive orders you will continue, you will amend, and you will revoke. And I made the decision to revoke all executive orders made by the prior administration following September 24th.
And I made that decision because that was the date, for the first time in our city's history, when the mayor of this city was indicted. And it was a day at which many New Yorkers started to doubt, even more than they did, the motivations behind any executive order or executive action that was going to be taken.
And so, I made that decision with regards to every executive order that was issued after that date. And that also included orders pertaining to Rikers, for example.
Question: Mr. Mayor, you're here in Greenpoint, and this place is named after a Polish priest from a parish nearby. I just wanted to ask you if you can speak to Polish-Americans who are still living here. What's your connection to them? What's your plans on working with them? Thank you so much.
Mayor Mamdani: Absolutely. I have to say that I have deep respect for Polish New Yorkers who have made this neighborhood what it is, and a respect also for the fact that they have done so under difficult conditions over many years. And yet, what we see today is that this thriving, blooming, beautiful neighborhood is one that is also pricing out many who have lived here for decades.
And while I served in the state assembly, I had the pleasure of getting to know and calling a friend, our Assemblywoman Emily Gallagher, who would tell me time and time again of the plight of Polish constituents of hers, not just as tenants, but also as small business owners, and how they were being pushed out of this city.
And we want to ensure that we do not only remember Polish New Yorkers through the names of a park or a street or the institutions that we know in the neighborhood, but through a vibrant, living, breathing community that can afford to stay here.
That is going to be at the centerpiece of our work to make the most expensive city in the United States of America affordable. Thank you for your work.
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