Sutton Place: Leafy, Ritzy, Noisy

Whirr, thump. Whirr, thump. The noise of cars traversing the grooved concrete surface on FDR Drive has caused a number of residents, mostly at 35 Sutton Place, to complain. "It's really noisy. It's definitely a problem that has to be dealt with," the president of a neighborhood group, the Sutton Area Community Inc., Mary Clare Bergin, said.

Sutton Place is an exclusive leafy enclave of high-rises and swanky townhouses, including the official residence of the secretary-general of the United Nations. But despite the amenities of ample parks and riverfront views, some residents have more car noise than they want.

"It's an ongoing travesty," a resident of 35 Sutton Place who declined to be named said. Inhabitants of about 80 of the 130 apartments at 35 Sutton Place, a 21-floor white-brick high-rise between 58th and 59th streets, signed a complaint letter last year. In March, the Sutton Area Community Inc. adopted a resolution in support of them, and a group of concerned residents will be meeting with Assemblyman Jonathan Bing, a Democrat of the East Side, later this month.

The view from 35 Sutton Place is the southbound roadway of the FDR Drive, where three lanes of southbound traffic run atop three northbound lanes.

To the south of 35 Sutton Place, between 54th and 58th streets, the FDR roadway is under a cover built in the 1930s.

State Senator Liz Krueger, a Democrat of the East Side, said that she, Community Board 6, and other elected officials had raised complaints with the state Department of Transportation. In April, the FDR Drive reopened after reconstruction costing $139 million that began in 1999. Some residents of 35 Sutton Place had indicated a preference for asphalt rather than concrete as a road surface, but the DOT estimated that it would greatly lower the lifespan of reconstruction, according to a letter Ms. Krueger sent in March.

To accommodate the complaints, however, last August the DOT completed a diamond grinding of the roadway surface to lower tire noise, even though it had no legal obligation to do so. (While federal noise guidelines require noise levels on new highways to be 67 decibels or lower, the FDR Drive reconstruction does not qualify as newly built, so noise abatement is not required.)

The DOT also reset joints below the FDR surface and covered them with rubber. Now the DOT is basically saying, "That's it. We're done," Ms. Krueger said.

A reporter's calls to the Transportation Department were not returned.

Even with the repairs, a vice president of Sutton Area Community, Leonard Ladin, said the decibel level was very high. Cars going over the concrete slabs make a "bang, bang, bang sound," he said.

The minutes of the transportation committee of Community Board 6 from last month show that it has decided that the matter was a state function, and therefore beyond the committee's purview.

Asked about upcoming his meeting with constituents complaining about the noise, Mr. Bing told The New York Sun that he takes their concerns seriously.

In what is literally a side issue, during the reconstruction, there was a temporary highway running out into the river from roughly 52nd to 61st streets. The chairman of the transportation committee of Community Board 6, Lou Sepersky, said there has been intense community pressure to adapt a pared down version of the structure into a pedestrian and bikeway that would link into the Greenway around Manhattan.