Residents of Roslyn Heights remain frustrated by the lack of a sound barrier wall along the service road that lines several neighborhoods in their village.

According to members of the Roslyn Heights Civic Association, there is a 250-ft. gap on Powerhouse Road, between Roslyn Road and Mineola Avenue. As a result, the noise from the constant stream of traffic on the Long Island Expressway exceeds federal guidelines.

In order to meet such guidelines, the decibel level would have to be lowered by seven decibels per house and by five decibels for two family units.

Chris Cavaliere, president of the civic association, notes that every village in Long Island has a sound barrier wall that meets federal guidelines. Roslyn Heights, he maintains, is the only entity that has such a large gap. Roslyn Heights falls under the jurisdiction of the Town of North Hempstead. Mayors in villages across the Island fought hard to get such walls, Cavaliere said, while maintaining that the town hasn't been fighting hard enough for Roslyn Heights interests.

Cavaliere said that civic association members have spent two years writing letters to the town asking them to erect a sound barrier wall. That effort has failed, and now the civic association wants the town to take the New York State Department of Transportation to court in order to get the noise level down.

"The first thing is to organize," Cavaliere said. "Otherwise they [the town] won't do anything." In this case, that means drafting a letter to the town attorney, requesting that the town engage the DOT through legal means. In addition to court action, the civic association would like an engineer to be hired, one who could design a wall that will keep the sound decibels under control.

A spokesman for the Town of North Hempstead said that its Public Works Commissioner, Gil Anderson, has held several meetings with DOT officials on the sound barrier wall. The DOT has done both a sound survey of the area and a cost benefit analysis. The DOT has determined that the cost for such a wall outweighs whatever "value for improvement" that wall might bring. And so, the town itself remains frustrated in its ability to get the DOT to change its position. However, town officials still hope to revisit the issue with the DOT, while trying to push them closer to the civic association's position that a wall should be built.

When construction on the LIE is finished, a sound barrier wall will become an even greater necessity, Cavaliere said. Eventually, the Long Island Expressway will be an eight-lane highway, only 60 feet from certain Roslyn Heights neighborhoods, he said. Not only that, Suffolk County is becoming "packed" by continuing development. "The cars are cruising by us," he said.

There is also traffic from the Harbor Links Golf Course and in time, there will be traffic caused by the planned senior housing development in Roslyn, Cavaliere added. "We are getting chiseled by expansion," he said. "And unless we come together as one voice, we're going to get run over."

In the summer of 2000, the civic association first expressed its desire to see a sound barrier wall constructed. Any plans by the DOT to build a wall were denied by a July 27, 2000 stop work order, one issued by Nassau County Judge Thomas A. Adams. However, the DOT had earlier concluded that the area between the Roslyn Road and Mineola Avenue did not meet the noise abatement threshold required for a sound barrier.

Doreen Banks, then a town councilmember and Linda Brickman of the town's Planning Department soon met with DOT officials, who themselves agreed to reconsider its earlier decision. But no action has taken place since then. While the civic association supports the wall, several Roslyn Heights businesses filed legal action against such construction. Lawyers for the businesses claimed that a wall would adversely effect their properties, on both practical and environmental grounds.

Finally, in December 2000, the town board passed a resolution in support of a sound barrier wall. The resolution put the board "on record" in their support of Roslyn Heights residents who wanted a wall. It also urged state officials to "take all necessary and lawful measures, in litigation and otherwise, to implement the construction of sound barrier walls on the north side of the LIE between Roslyn Road and Mineola Avenue."