The interest generated by the event attests to the deep roots the Gowanus tunnel movement has developed in west Brooklyn. NY State will be hard pressed to ever win sufficient political support to rebuild the expressway in place, as it has proposed since the early 1990s (see MTR #277).

The community prize winner was the product of the Sunset Park Redesign Collaborative - a series of design workshops the Sam Schwartz Co. convened with local citizens. The design separates truck, bike and car traffic with a focus on a safe, aesthetically pleasing environment for the pedestrian. In the professional category, Bruce Bruce A. Silverberg Architects took the top prize with a design proposing a grand plaza between 40th and 44th Streets, flanked by a traffic-calmed, two-lane 3^rd Avenue with a median bike path. Four other designs gained honorable mentions. A plan by Beth Weinstein, of RWA, a Brooklyn firm, redesigns the street grid in the industrial area west of Third Avenue to create three widened north-south and east-west "industrial access streets." Off-street loading docks would serve inter-modal connections, large industrial buildings and new commercial businesses on 3rd Ave. The design by Gans & Jelacic creates a linear park along 3rd Ave. with bike and pedestrian paths. Two other proposals transform 3rd Ave. into a mixed residential area and greenway, with a tree-lined median and wide sidewalks. All three use the new space to link Sunset Park to its waterfront.

Judges included Al Appleton of the Regional Plan Association (RPA), Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez (District 12), a representative from the City Planning Department, a design firm, Pratt University, and a Brooklyn developer.