U.N Week For Browning Students

U.N. week will be the death of New York streets.

Every year, U.N. officials charge into New York City and the traffic becomes horrific. This last week it took an hour and thirty minutes to get home on the bus when it usually only takes around an hour. Traffic is always a nightmare in New York during U.N. week as police and special officials cars clog the streets. This year 193 U.N. officials came to the U.N. to talk about issues around the world.

  Because of U.N. week, some kids only got to school at 8:20. This is just when school started. As you can guess, this is a huge problem as it makes a multitude of kids late for class. A multitude of streets spanning from 56th street to 40th street are blocked leaving limited access for movement for drivers. I noticed that as cars clogged the streets, people filled the sidewalk. One good thing about the traffic extravaganza that is U.N. week happened, a lot more people started walking to work, school, or home. I myself had to walk quite a lot. It was pretty fun to walk a bit but the scary thing is that taking the car is usually faster, whereas during U.N. week it is faster to walk. Traffic was moving at an average speed of four miles per hour.

Here is an interview with Browning bus driver, Jose Gutierrez.

Jack: Mr. Jose, how was traffic during U.N. week compared to other U.N. weeks this year?

Mr. Jose: During the pandemic it was not that bad but now that everybody is out and about again it is getting really bad.

Jack: How does two wheel vehicles coming back into play affect traffic this year?

Mr. Jose: The bikes and motorcycles make traffic definitely much worse, as they drive through lanes and cut people off.

Jack: Did this bus have to change from its usual route to get to school on time?

Mr Jose: Yes it did, sometimes we had to take different routes each day.

Jack: Thank you for your time Mr Jose.

As you can see the U.N. week traffic heavily affects kids trying to leave and get to school.

Citations:

“NYC DOT Announces “Gridlock Alert” Days, Beginning with United Nations General Assembly next Week.” Www.nyc.gov, www.nyc.gov/html/dot/html/pr2023/gridlock-alert-days.shtml#:~:text=NYC%20DOT%20traffic%20data%20shows. Accessed 28 Sept. 2023.

Rahmanan, A. (2023, September 18). These NYC streets are now closed for the UN General Assembly. Time Out New York. https://www.timeout.com/newyork/news/these-streets-are-now-closed-for-the-un-general-assembly-091823 

United Nations. (n.d.). United Nations, main body, main organs, General Assembly. United Nations. https://www.un.org/en/ga/