Big changes are coming to one stretch of the New York City waterfront. In his recent State of the City address, Mayor Bill de Blasio introduced an ambitious plan for a new streetcar system that would connect the city’s most populous borough, Brooklyn, to its largest, Queens. Citing “explosive growth on the waterfront in Brooklyn and Queens,” the mayor proclaimed: “Today, we take the next great step in connecting New Yorkers to the heart of our new economy for New York.”

The new sixteen-mile, street-level system would link Astoria to Sunset Park, with stops along the way in Long Island City, Greenpoint, Williamsburg, the Navy Yard, DUMBO, Downtown Brooklyn, and Red Hook. Trains would travel at around 11.3 miles per hour alongside automobiles, and connect with several existing bus and rail lines, as well as the new ferry lines the mayor proposed in his last State of the City address. In addition to several commercial clusters, the line could service 45,000 public housing residents who live along the proposed route.

The plan’s price tag currently stands at $2.5 billion. Some of that cost would be borne by riders, whose fares would be pegged to the cost of a subway swipe, but most of it would be paid for through gentrification. According to the New York Times, “administration officials believe the system’s cost can be offset by tax revenue siphoned from an expected rise in property values along the route.” Seen from this vantage point, the streetcar proposal seems less a transportation plan than a real estate stimulus.