I don't see anyone addressing the real problem- that there is simply too much motor vehicle traffic in and through our community.
Why should a great neighborhood amenity be compromised to accommodate people (many not JH residents) driving to and through our community?
Sure, plenty of people in the neighborhood own vehicles and use them to commute or to make longer trips, but how many people in the neighborhood drive to go less than a mile within the neighborhood, and in such a dense neighborhood is that type of travel really practical or efficient?
Sure the closure of 34th Ave affects the levels of traffic on other local streets, but there must be other options than going back to the status quo of making 34th Ave another alternative car sewer to Northern Blvd. The residents of our community young, old, and everything in between deserve better. 35th Ave should not remain the alternative car sewer to Northern Blvd either.
One possibility, which would be difficult in the short term but beneficial in the long term would be to for the DOT to redesign the streets to discourage driving in JH. Restricting through traffic on 35th Ave (with exceptions for buses and school buses), coupled with sufficient signage and enforcement to discourage through traffic on our community streets would be difficult to achieve, but not impossible. Yes it would be much easier to go back to what we had before, but it would be a short term solution to a long term problem. In a few years, the whole neighborhood will be as congested as it is now with 34th open (because it is currently open, not closed) and our quality of life will still suffer. Our community deserves better.
If we make driving easier, more people will continue to drive here, if we make it more difficult to drive here, less people will choose to do so.