Enclosing the BQE

Robert Moses’s Brooklyn-Queens Expressway (BQE) did not meet the fate of his proposed roadway bisecting Washington Square Park and the Lower Manhattan Expressway. The BQE hints at the destruction that would have befallen parts of SoHo and the Lower East Side, but it also illustrates some creative civil engineering and urban design where it passes under Brooklyn Heights, specifically the promenade that offers amazing views of Manhattan. As an architectural alternative to the landscaped berm, Daniel Rattner from the Studio for Civil Architecture, along with Hage Engineering PC, is proposing the Brooklyn Bridge Connector, a structure of steel arches spanning the different levels with coverings of translucent sound baffling acoustical shells and photovoltaic fabric.