Lillian Edelstein

Lillian Edelstein

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The so-called "Jewish housewife" of East Tremont in the Bronx, Lillian Edelstein led a grassroots battle to protect her neighborhood from the path of Robert Moses's Cross Bronx Expressway. Though ultimately unsuccessful, her efforts helped to forge a tradition of local advocacy for neighborhoods and lively streets.

The Cross Bronx Expressway

In the works since the late 1920s, construction began on the Cross Bronx Expressway in 1948. Its purpose, in the eyes of planners, was to connect the George Washington Bridge with routes to Long Island and New England. The cost, however, would be high. It would have to pass through difficult topographical conditions, as well as the paths of hundreds of utility lines, roads, and railroads. Worse, thousands of people would have to be relocated. The remaining neighborhoods would be decimated by six sunken lanes of traffic, a no-man's-land for playing children, storefronts, and passers-by.

The project was overseen by Robert Moses, an unelected player at City Hall who almost single-handedly spearheaded the construction of New York City's modern maze of superhighways. Construction on the expressway began in 1948 and lasted until 1963.

Edelstein's Struggle in East Tremont

In large part because of Lillian Edelstein, the East Tremont neighborhood became the last stand of resistance against the encroaching road. The story is documented in Robert Caro's classic biography of Robert Moses, The Power Broker. By the early 50s, it was a neighborhood dominated by working-class Jews who had been reared in the socialist and radical political movements of the early twentieth century. More and more, as poor Blacks and Puerto Ricans moved in and around them, the old guard sought to preserve their community as well as their egalitarian ideals.

On December 4, 1952, thousands of East Tremont residents received letters, signed by Robert Moses, informing them that their homes would be condemned to make room for the Cross Bronx Expressway. It gave them only ninety days to leave, though the letter didn't mention that Moses had still not acquired title for the property. "It was like the floor opened up underneath your feet," Edelstein remembered.[1]

Like many of her neighbors, Edelstein had deep roots in East Tremont. Her mother and sister were also in the way of Moses's expressway. She and her husband Sam couldn't afford to lose their apartment's affordable $56 rent. Relocation would inevitably mean either worse conditions, higher expenses, or both. Though, in her words, "just a housewife,"[2] Edelstein's instinctive passion made her fall into leadership of the East Tremont Neighborhood Association (ETNA).

By 1952, the expressway's construction was already well underway in other areas of the Bronx, so Edelstein and ETNA couldn't have hoped to stop the project entirely. But there was an opportunity. On the Association's urging, the New York State Society of Engineers developed an alternate plan, which would redirect its path two blocks south, along the north end of Crotona Park. That way, 1,530 apartments would be spared at no expense. It seemed like a good idea for everybody.

Edelstein and ETNA faced an uphill fight. Robert Moses and his allies were formidable opponents in City Hall, warning councilmembers with the threat of losing federal funds. Having no lawyers in the neighborhood to offer their services, Edelstein struggled to raise funds to pay legal expenses. Her neighbors, most struggling to get by, had little to donate to the cause. She worked with teams of engineers to develop alternate plans and distributed them to city newspapers. She organized fundraisers and rallies, galvanized local businesses, and preached her cause on local radio stations.

All her efforts managed to drag the hearings at the City Planning Commission on for months. But at the very end, Moses's political maneuvering, and his route, prevailed in late 1953. Even to the end Edelstein felt sure that the politicians would be persuaded by her more sensible alternative.

Aftermath

It remains a puzzle why Robert Moses insisted on taking the expressway straight through the center of East Tremont. In The Power Broker, Robert Caro points out that the Third Avenue Transit depot, which stood in the way of the alternate route, remains the most reasonable explanation. Several key Bronx politicians held an interest in the depot, and they expressed to Moses a desire that it not be relocated. But could that be enough to cost the relocation of thousands? It may, in the end, have been a matter of sheer stubbornness on the part of Moses.

By January 1954, the city had taken title of the East Tremont apartment buildings; Lillian Edelstein and her neighbors were evicted. Many felt that City Hall failed to live up to their promises in the relocation process.

After the completion of the expressway, the Jewish community in East Tremont fell apart. Even poorer populations followed them there. Bisected by all the noise and fumes of six lanes of congested traffic, the neighborhood has become and epicenter of violence, poverty, and drug abuse. Some contend that this decline was already underway before Robert Moses came to East Tremont. But one wonders if Lillian Edelstein and her neighbors, who stood up to the bosses of City Hall, would have also stood up to save their streets from neglect.

Legacy

Though Lillian Edelstein and ETNA were unable save their neighborhood, their struggle continues to be remembered by community activists. It may be, in fact, that the lessons they learned helped to guide Jane Jacobs's successful efforts later in the decade to avert another of Moses's expressways in lower Manhattan. [3] Compared to Jacobs's, however, Edelstein's work has gone relatively unnoticed despite the heroic portrait of her in Robert Caro's biography of Moses.