Exclusive | NYC pledged to clean up the Broadway of the Bronx but its still teeming with junkies: These streets are full of zombies

The “Broadway of the Bronx” is a drug-ridden wasteland, where hordes of zonked-out junkies openly buy dope, shoot up and overdose in broad daylight — despite city officials’ years-old pledge to end the ceaseless squalor.The Post spent several days in “The Hub” — the commercial area between Melrose and Mott Haven that encompasses Roberto Clemente Plaza — and found scenes of drug-fueled depravity and an ever-present unwelcome haze of crack smoke.Two addicts were seen suffering apparent overdoses and dozens more nodded off or involuntarily contorted their bodies into the telltale “fentanyl fold.”One potential overdose victim lay face down on the sidewalk for 10 minutes until a fellow addict gave him doses of life-saving Narcan.A few feet away, a haggard man nonchalantly injected a syringe into a woman’s neck.“These streets are full of zombies,” said Emilio Morales, general manager of the landmark Opera House Hotel, a 3-star inn on East 149th Street.

“It has never been as bad as it is now.”Morales’ concerns aren’t new — he and other local business leaders in 2021 sent a letter to then-Mayor Bill de Blasio, pleading for action on the drug-dealing, homelessness and crime consuming The Hub.They’re still waiting.Efforts by City Hall and the NYPD to permanently clamp down on the open-air drug markets have been unsuccessful, said frustrated locals and elected leaders.“It’s very bad, very bad, very bad,” said Siraj Bhaiyat, the owner of local variety store Willis Discount.

“It’s been like this for three years, but it’s getting worse and worse.”A cadre of local leaders cut the ribbon on Roberto Clemente Plaza in 2018, with hopes of turning it into the Herald Square of the Bronx.But local after local said that sunny vision for the plaza — and The Hub as a whole — quickly became eclipsed by darkness.“When they opened the plaza, they had jazz music and everything, it was very nice,” said Morales, the hotel manager.“N...