The Alliance sent the following letter to the owner of Trade Fair Supermarkets. Copies were also sent to the various officials and agencies listed at the letter's end.

March 19, 2007

Mr. Farid Jaber C.E.O.

Trade Fair Supermarkets

Trade Fair Corporate Office

30-12 30^th Ave. Astoria, NY 11102

Dear Mr. Jaber,

The 37-75 Alliance is made up of residents and small business owners in the vicinity of 37^th Ave. and 75^th St. in Jackson Heights, who have organized to address a variety of problems confronting us on a daily basis. Our goal is to improve the residents’ quality of life as well as the experience of those who come here to shop and visit. We are working with various agencies and organizations including the office of Councilwoman Sears, Community Board #3, the 115^th Precinct, the NYC Department of Transportation and Department of Environmental Protection, and the NYPD’s Traffic Enforcement Division.

As explained below, a number of our most pressing problems are related directly or indirectly to the operation of the Trade Fair Supermarket at 37-05 37^th Avenue. We hope that by bringing these issues to your attention we can work together to resolve them in as friendly and timely a fashion as possible. While this is not the first time that Trade Fair has been the target of community complaints (see, for instance, the Oct. 18, 2001 public session of Community Board #3), we believe that your company’s long-term interests and those of our neighborhood coincide. Your store provides a welcome service. We appreciate the challenges you face in its daily operation, but believe that the solutions to these challenges must be respectful of the surrounding residences and businesses. Unfortunately, this often does not apply to the Trade Fair store in question.

Trade Fair’s operation at 37^th Ave. and 75^th St. creates two main types of problems for the neighborhood: traffic congestion and noise. Congestion comes primarily from the supermarket’s delivery trucks. Many times during the day the number of trucks exceeds available loading zones. When this happens trucks frequently double-park, creating a series of further traffic problems. Trade Fair’s larger delivery trucks occasionally bring traffic on 75^th St. between 37^th and 35^th Aves. to a complete stop. Such congestion, in addition to the air pollution created by so much exhaust, leads to honking by frustrated drivers, adding to the problem of excessive noise described below. The 18-wheel tractor-trailers used by Trade Fair’s purveyors—too large to be operated on residential side streets in the first place—make each of the other problems discussed here even worse.

This congestion also means that Trade Fair trucks regularly double-park and unload outside of designated loading zones. On 75^th St. this means that they regularly double-park and unload next to the residential buildings on both sides of the block. Montclair Gardens, on the east side of 75^th, has a narrow garden and sidewalk separating it from the street. When trucks maneuver to unload here they are very close to apartment windows. Trucks regularly park and unload in the fire hydrant zone on the west side of this part of the block as well, next to the apartments of Wemberly Gardens.

All this truck activity has a negative impact not only on the residents of 75^th St. but also on nearby businesses, including Armondo’s Italian Restaurant at 74-27 37^th Ave., with its glass-enclosed patio on 75^th St., and the Little India Emporium, located on the corner at 75-01 37^th Ave., where Trade Fair’s unloading activity regularly blocks customer access to the store’s side display windows and entrance. Those who rent office space on the west side of the Brunson Building at 7409 37^th Ave. are also adversely affected by the noise from the activity directly below their windows.

While the congestion discussed here is primarily vehicular, pedestrian traffic is also affected, especially near the supermarket’s service entrance on 75^th St. Here there is frequently an obstacle course of workers, steel conveyor ramps, powered palette-lifts, and piles of boxes obstructing pedestrian flow. Many of these pedestrians are elderly or young mother’s with strollers.

Making matters here worse, Trade Fair has positioned its bottle recycling station immediately adjacent to the unloading area, resulting in further clogging of the sidewalk as people wait with shopping carts piled high with bottles and cans. The ensuing chaos frequently blocks all but a very narrow passage down the sidewalk for a portion of every weekday morning and sometimes on Saturday and Sunday. The recycling station creates additional problems for Montclair Gardens with the noise of its machines and with the litter and odor that regularly collects around it. This litter affects not only the sidewalk area but regularly blows through the adjacent fence into Montclair’s front garden, making it difficult to keep clean.

Trade Fair’s delivery trucks are also the most important source of a severe noise problem in this immediate area. In addition to the noise of engines, some trucks have loud compressors. Although all vehicles making deliveries are supposed to shut off their engines and compressors, they frequently do not, adding to the daylong racket near the store. The worst offenders in this regard are the overnight garbage collection trucks that service Trade Fair. These two or three nightly garbage pick-ups regularly occur after midnight—usually as late as 3 or 4 a.m.—and are among the loudest trucks of all. No one who lives near this end of the block ever has an uninterrupted night’s sleep because of these trucks. Recent amendments to the noise control code of New York City, which take effect July 1, 2007, strictly restrict refuse collection noise between 11:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m. [Subchapter 5: §24-225]. We encourage Trade Fair to not wait until July but to act as quickly as possible to address this problem.

There are numerous secondary issues that need to be addressed with regard to the Trade Fair supermarket in question, including the noise of compressors on the roof of the store, which the Environmental Protection Agency recently found in excess of regulations (complaint #1517852). The three trees and tree pits on 75^th St. are another area of concern. Dirty cleaning water, which will kill the trees, is occasionally dumped in the pits, and while we appreciate the effort, the recently installed tree guards were immediately destroyed by delivery trucks and unloading activity. There is an overall problem of litter, spillage, and breakage in the unloading and bottle recycling areas.

While some of the solutions to the problems noted here may be long-term, there are a number of key steps that Trade Fair management should take immediately to address the problems we have detailed:

1) Require all drivers to turn off engines and compressors when stopped near the store for deliveries. This must be strictly enforced, especially on 75^th St., as trucks that may not seem loud disturb nearby residents with their constant activity.

2) Make certain that trucks do not unload beyond the commercial loading zone on 75^th St. There should be no parking or double-parking of delivery trucks next to the residential buildings here. This applies especially to Sunday mornings, when an 18-wheeler frequently parks in metered parking spaces next to Montclair Gardens to unload.

3) Reschedule all garbage collections to earlier in the evening, prior to 11 p.m., in anticipation of the new citywide regulations taking effect in July..

4) Organize deliveries more efficiently, so that so many trucks are not arriving at the same time. This single item would have a dramatic impact on the problems described here, since there are times during the day when the loading zones are empty.

5) Relocate the bottle recycling station, possibly to the rear of the store’s new expansion on 37^th Ave.

One of the strategies of the 37-75 Alliance is to educate neighborhood residents and business owners about the process of filing complaints with the city agencies with oversight for the problems raised here. We are hoping that Trade Fair voluntarily addresses these issues, making the filing of such complaints unnecessary

Very truly,

(Signatures attached)

cc:

Councilwoman Helen Sears (3732 75^th St., Jackson Heights, NY 11372)

Vasantrai Ghandi, Chair of Community Board 3 (82-11 37^th Ave., Jackson Heights, NY 11372)

Giovanna Reid, DM of Community Board 3 (82-11 37^th Ave., Jackson Heights, NY 11372)

Senator John D. Sabini (35-07 88^th St., Jackson Heights, NY 11372)

Assemblyman José R. Peralta (82-11 37^th Ave., Jackson Heights, NY 11372)

Congressman Joseph Crowley (74-09 37^th Ave. Ste. 306B, Jackson Heights, NY 11372)

Capt. Timothy Kelly, 115^th Precinct NYPD (9215 Northern Blvd., Jackson Heights, NY 11372)

Maura McCarthy, DOT Queens Commissioner (30-30 Thomson Avenue, 5th Floor, North, Long Island City, NY 11101)

Michael Pelicki, Deputy Inspector, Parking Enforcement Division (330 W. 34^th St. 8^th Fl., New York, NY 10001)