Get the latest Syracuse news delivered right to your inbox.
Subscribe to our newsletter here.

On Saturday, about 150 Syracuse community members demanding economic, racial and environmental justice for the impacts of the Interstate 81 viaduct marched from Dr. King Elementary School to the New York state office building in downtown Syracuse.

“No justice, no peace,” the demonstrators chanted. “I-81 has got to go.”

In 2019, the New York State Department of Transportation announced that it would recommend a plan to remove the viaduct and replace it with a community grid alternative of surface level streets in the area. Syracuse University Chancellor Kent Syverud announced that the university would endorse the plan. 

Deka Dancil, president of the Urban Jobs Task Force, said that the business and job opportunities for the new project should include the local residents. The viaduct’s construction should supply more jobs to Syracuse residents, Dancil said, and those who are most severely impacted by the viaduct — specifically Syracuse’s Black community — should have job opportunities during construction of a viaduct alternative. 

“A nickel doesn’t even last in that community,” said Charles Pierce-El, a Syracuse native and president of the South Side Homeowner Association. “It’s a shame. We got resources. We got economic development. We got to start doing for ourselves.”

Despite the many jobs that will be created by the removal of the I-81 viaduct, air pollution and other quality of living issues have long been a concern for residents, especially those in neighborhoods near the viaduct.

Members of the community march through the city of Syracuse, asking for the takedown of I-81 because of the damage it has done to parts of the community, such as high pollution and asthma rates, specifically near the local elementary school. Francis Tang | Asst. Copy Editor

Ryedell Davis, a demonstrator at the protest, went to Dr. King Elementary School and grew up next to the viaduct. He suffered from severe asthma and had to visit the hospital three or four times every month during elementary school, he said. 

Dr. King Elementary School has a high asthma rate among students, said Lanessa Owens-Chaplin, Project I-81 counsel for the New York Civil Liberties Union. The city of Syracuse has an average rate of asthma of 12.7% while New York state, excluding New York City, averages 10.4%.

NYSDOT also plans to build a roundabout close to Dr. King Elementary School, which is in a largely Black neighborhood and where about 550 children ranging from the ages of three and 11 are enrolled, Owens-Chaplin said. The roundabout is estimated to carry 39,000 cars per day after completion. 

Additionally, SU’s Steam Station also sits in a neighborhood bordering I-81, which contributes to the pollution in the area. The station has disproportionately impacted Black residents and significantly depressed land value, according to a report from the NYCLU. 

Protestors of March for Justice for I-81, organized by @UJTFsyracuse and @NYCLU, departed from Dr. King Elementary School just now. pic.twitter.com/KjXU3ciOjx

— Francis B. Tang (@francis_towne) August 14, 2021

The Steam Station is another example of environmental and structural racism, as it sacrifices the health of local community members to benefit SU students, said Owens-Chaplin. 

“Everyday (students) take a shower in the morning, (students) are benefiting from the burden of the surrounding community,” Owens-Chaplin said. She hopes more SU students will get to know more about the community surrounding them, she said.

Although SU provides the Co-Generation Scholarship — which covers tuition, fees, room and board to students who live in the neighborhood surrounding the Steam Station — Owens-Chaplin said there is more SU should do to repair local air pollution and the relationship with the local community.

Lanessa Owens-Chaplin, the Project I-81 Lanessa Owens-Chaplin, the counsel for the New York Civil Liberties Union, marches with demonstrators and explains the deconstruction of I-81 must involve the communities who were most impacted by the construction. Francis Tang | Asst. Copy Editor

“I-81 has got to go, we all agree,” Owens-Chaplin said. “However, it has to come down in a fair way. It has to come down in a way that people who were impacted the most — the Black and brown people who live in that community — are not again forgotten.”

The NYSDOT will hold two virtual public hearings on Aug. 17 and two in-person hearings on Aug. 18. Dancil said the demonstration’s organizers hope to see more local residents raise their voices on the future of the I-81 project and amplify their demands to the department. 

“It wasn’t that we didn’t know what was happening to our community. It’s that we couldn’t stop it,” Owens-Chaplin said. “We are going to continue this fight, let the DOT know that they are not going to do what they did to us 50 years ago again.”

Published on August 15, 2021 at 10:57 am

Contact Francis: btang05@syr.edu | @francis_towne