A Bayside footbridge will be torn down in December by the Department of Transportation, and neighbors and elected officials are upset nothing is going up to replace it. NY1's Thabie Sibanda filed the following report.

Construction work is underway near 42nd Avenue and 216th Street at a Bayside footbridge, a pedestrian pathway over the Long Island Railroad tracks. Department of Transportation workers drilled into the ground Wednesday morning as they prepare to remove it next month.

With no plan to replace it, neighbors and elected officials are outraged.

"I'm quite devastated because this bridge has been here since I've lived here for 16 years," said resident Tatiana Guerra.

"For the city of New York to arbitrarily decide, 'Well, the bridge needs to be replaced, but we're not going to do it, we're just going to take it down,' it's disgraceful," said State Senator Tony Avella.

Neighbors and elected officials say removing this bridge would force pedestrians to walk five blocks to get over the railroad tracks.

"This bridge has helped me to get across and get to the bus quicker, and it has a lot of memories," said Guerra.

But the city says it's no longer safe to use. It's easy to see where it's eroding, with some steps barely being held up by falling signs underneath.

"I can understand that," said community activist Henry Euler. "That's very important that it be a safe bridge. So they need to do something about it and have it fixed or replaced as soon as possible."

A DOT spokesperson says it presented a design in 2007 that was compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act, but local stakeholders didn't like the look of the ramps.

"It's an important amenity in this community. Without it, I do believe that the traffic would increase tremendously on 221st and on Bell Boulevard," said Ocelia Claro, vice chair of Community Board 11.

Julie Ryan works for a fire alarm company that has buildings on either side of the tracks.

"We have paperwork that goes back and forth. We have an engineer that brings back the drawings from the other building to here," said Ryan.

Avella says the city needs to allocate money to replace it.

"In the scheme of a billion dollars of budget, this is really nothing," said Avella.

DOT says it is open to discussions about a future replacement bridge.