A patch of asphalt that spent decades as a parking spot for cars ducking off the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway is now a car-free plaza, thanks to a gay bar in Williamsburg that spent years pushing the city to make it happen. The Exley, at 1 Jackson Street, inaugurated the new pedestrian space on the block of Jackson Street between Meeker Avenue and Union Avenue, turning what had been a slip lane and informal parking lot into public space the bar will manage and operate going forward.
The conversion is the result of years of advocacy by owner Matthew Rickie, who applied for the plaza through New York City's plaza program and worked with the North Brooklyn Parks Alliance to set it up, according to Streetsblog New York City. The New York City Department of Transportation approved the plaza but has not become involved beyond that approval, the outlet reported, though the agency plans to give the space more attention next year. Rickie opened The Exley in 2011 and added roadway outdoor dining back in 2020, well before the city formally signed off on the full pedestrianization.
The bar bought café tables, picnic tables, and plants to furnish the new space, and Rickie has bigger plans still: he envisions the plaza eventually hosting flea markets, live music, and a queer food festival. The Exley is currently the only business on Jackson Street, a detail that sets this project apart from multi-merchant commercial strips where street closures have proven far more contentious.
A Slip Lane With a Painful History
The stretch of pavement now hosting picnic tables sits at the intersection of Jackson Street, Meeker Avenue, and Union Avenue, in the shadow of the elevated expressway that reshaped this corner of Williamsburg starting in the 1960s. State officials razed a church at the site to build the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, forcing the demolition of Mount Carmel Church, per the same Streetsblog report. Italian immigrants had founded Our Lady of Mount Carmel parish in Williamsburg back in 1887, and according to NYC Parks, the original church near Jackson Street was demolished to make way for the highway, pushing the congregation to relocate to North 8th Street.
That history is not forgotten nearby. Mt. Carmel Triangle, a small park inside the triangle formed by Jackson, Meeker, and Union, memorializes Mount Carmel Church today, sitting just steps from the new plaza. State Senator Kristin Gonzalez, who represents Greenpoint, said the plaza is part of a longer vision following the loss caused by the BQE and the church demolition, framing the small pedestrian space as one piece of repairing damage the highway inflicted on the neighborhood decades ago.
The plaza's opening drew a notable turnout of elected officials, with Assembly Member Emily Gallagher, State Senator Julia Salazar, and Senator Gonzalez all attending. Gallagher represents Greenpoint, while Salazar represents Bushwick. Paul Benson said The Exley built community in a previously derelict and undesirable space, and separately praised the bar for reclaiming public space that had sat underused for years.
Part of a Bigger Push Along the Highway
The Jackson Street plaza is the first of the BQE's many slip roads to be pedestrianized, but advocates have wanted to turn the highway's diagonal pockets into parks for years. BQE construction created these small diagonal pockets along the highway when it was built through Brooklyn in the 1960s, leaving scattered slivers of leftover land that have mostly functioned as informal parking ever since. The North Brooklyn Parks Alliance, which is responsible for the nearby Berry Street Open Street, also helped convert other streets into car-free plazas, including Banker's Anchor at North 15th Street and Nassau Avenue in Greenpoint, which the group operates alongside the Jackson Street project.
Katie Denny Horowitz said North Brooklyn advocates are trying to reclaim as many public-space pockets as possible, a strategy that reflects a documented shortage of green space in the surrounding district. Brooklyn Community District 1, covering Williamsburg and Greenpoint, falls significantly below the city's recommended per-capita parkland target, according to NYC Community Board 1, with rapid residential growth since the 2005 waterfront rezoning intensifying demand for public green space. The North Brooklyn Parks Alliance's broader ambitions extend to Under the K Bridge Park, a 7-acre stretch of former industrial land beneath the BQE that the group transformed in 2021 into a park, native plant nursery, and event venue, as Time Out has reported.
Not Every Street Closure Survives
Turning highway leftovers into plazas has not always gone smoothly in this part of Brooklyn. A locksmith and hardware store lobbied to end the Bedford Slip Open Street in 2024, and the temporary pedestrian space, which existed for six weeks during a G train subway shutdown, was ultimately shut down after opposition from local merchants who said it hurt sales and complicated deliveries, according to the Greenpoint Star. That failed experiment illustrates why single-business sites like Jackson Street, where The Exley is the lone storefront, face far less friction than commercial strips with multiple shop owners weighing in on curb access.
Broader data suggests the economic case for pedestrianized streets is strong when it works. A 2026 report from the Office of the New York State Comptroller found that restaurants and bars on open streets experienced faster sales growth and lower business closure rates during the pandemic than those on control streets, according to the Comptroller's office. Will Livingston called the Jackson Street project a pop-up plaza that creates public space quickly, a description that captures how The Exley's plaza sidestepped the slower, more contested process that doomed Bedford Slip.
Rickie has said the growth of such public-space projects benefits the community, and he has called for continued city investment and eased restrictions on roadway access to help more of these conversions happen. For now, the jackson street plaza stands as the newest, and so far only successful, attempt to permanently pedestrianize one of the BQE's leftover slip lanes — with city officials, neighborhood advocates, and one Williamsburg gay bar all betting it will not be the last.
