N.Y. Braces for ‘Gorbylock’

New Yorkers are living in dread this week of “Gorbylock”--a huge traffic snarl expected when Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev comes to address the United Nations and meet with President Reagan and President-elect George Bush.

On Sunday, local newspapers and radio stations were advising residents of the city, already besieged by the yearly onslaught of Christmas shoppers, to avoid major roadways from Gorbachev’s arrival Tuesday to his departure Friday morning.

“There will be numerous traffic delays in Manhattan, but remember: It’s gridlock for the sake of world peace,” Deputy Transportation Commissioner Samuel Schwartz said in an advisory published in the New York Daily News.

Authorities plan to allow the Kremlin leader free reign of the Big Apple during his three days here, creating a nightmarish security task. They anticipate Gorbachev will want to take spontaneous tours of Broadway and Wall Street while his fashion-conscious wife, Raisa, goes shopping at Bloomingdale’s or Macy’s.

While Gorbachev’s speech at the U.N. on Wednesday and his lunch later that day on Governors Island with Reagan and Bush are the diplomatic high points, authorities are bracing for the unexpected, remembering Gorbachev’s impromptu stop at a busy Washington intersection a year ago to greet pedestrians during a summit with Reagan.

Wednesday and Thursday are expected to be the worst days for traffic. In addition to the Christmas shopping rush, Wednesday is matinee day on Broadway, which can add 50,000 vehicles to the 860,000 that normally enter Manhattan.

The Daily News predicted it will be “three days of vehicular hell.”