> The city survived just fine before the BQE, and would be able to do so again if it went away.

When the city was fine with it, we didn't have the population it does today AND we didn't debilitate our Borough's railroad infrastructure yet. Bay Ridge Branch was catenary electrified and multi track service with stubs to directly serve vendors for freight; solving the need for all of the trucks traveling to reach areas in Brooklyn. (Not subway)

We've done very little to boost up other modes of transportation outside of automobiles and now when we need alts we are screwed.