Dangerous and chaotic: Throggs Neck residents watch sink hole get worse and worse
Neighbors say it has been at the corner of Lafayette and Deane Avenues for at least two months.
Throggs Neck residents say a sink hole has been growing near the corner of Lafayette and Dean Avenues, getting deeper and worse by the day.
"People try to drive around it, but it's very big, so it's pretty much taking up the whole street," said Rosemarie Ferraro, who is in the area often to visit her boyfriend.
"It's chaos," agreed Eric Benvenuto, who lives up the street from it.
While traffic cones mark where it is, and most cars were able to swerve around it, neighbors say at night, it is not as obvious.
"Someone's car is going to fall into that hole," predicted Michael Fino, who lives around the corner.
Others, like Jennifer Liriano, who lives up the block, say they try to stay away from it, telling News 12, "either you just have to avoid it, or just be scared every time you pass near it."
Bronx Community Board 10 says that the New York City Department of Environmental Protection told them in March that a water main leak at one of the private houses on the road caused the sinkhole, and once the owner fixed the leak, the Department of Transportation would fix the hole.
"How long does it take? It's dangerous," replied Fino.
"It's really frustrating and it's like nobody cares about it," Ferraro said.
News 12 was able to find the homeowner, and while he did not want to speak on camera, he said he got the leak fixed three weeks ago, even sharing pictures to prove it.
He said that since then, he had not heard anything from the city.
"It's a waiting game, and meanwhile, during the waiting game, somebody could get hurt, you could get sued," reacted Benvenuto.
"It's on city property, so I think the city should just fix it," Ferraro added. "I don't know what they're waiting for."
Thursday afternoon, the DEP confirmed to News 12 that the leak had been fixed.
Both the DEP and DOT say they are working together to coordinate repairing the street, with the DOT saying it will try to provide a timeframe.
