When we New Yorkers reminisce about the bygone eras of past mayors, we remember highs or lows in our lives and those of our communities. Reviewing Mayor Bloomberg’s 12 years, for example, what comes to mind could be a low like routinely being stopped, questioned and frisked by police; or it could be a high, like breathing easier in bars and restaurants when cigarette smoking was banned there.
A view from the Williamsburg Bridge of people social distancing on the grass at East River Park on May 31, 2020 in New York City. (Rob Kim/Getty Images)
In the final months of his two terms, Mayor de Blasio now has the chance to avoid creating just such a low point in collective memory of his mayoralty. The East Side Coastal Resiliency project (ESCR) is slotted for substantial work beginning today, Monday, Nov. 1. As of now, the scope of that work includes the felling of 1,000 mature and healthy trees in East River Park.
This cannot happen. A wholesale sacrifice of irreplaceable public property may not be enacted by a city government without grave public deliberation — something that in this case has not taken place, as retired Judge Kathryn Freed, a former City Council member from the 1st District downtown, recently wrote in this newspaper. A 2022 deadline that’s part of the current equation can be changed; it’s man-made, after all. It already was extended, and need not warp the entire ESCR project. When we are literally crafting our future experience, we must prize quality over speed. Halt the chainsaws!
East River Park is absolutely vital to residents of nearby neighborhoods, from the Lower East Side north to Stuyvesant Town. Take a walk through on any given day, and you’ll find good vibes flowing in abundance, from a human ecosystem that developed over years, like all ecosystems.
Not long after Hurricane Sandy, via a program called Rebuild By Design, the idea was embraced, and federally funded, of remaking the southern end of Manhattan for better water management. Bloomberg released a plan in 2013, acknowledging that it would be up to the next mayor to implement. In 2018, de Blasio replaced Bloomberg’s plan with his own. Ground officially was broken this past April of 2021 in Stuyvesant Cove Park. And today, trees may begin to fall.
No one is ready for that. On this Monday afternoon, activists including City Council candidate Allie Ryan are being arrested for putting their bodies in the way of demolition — and not because they oppose adapting the park to buffer the city from effects of climate change. On the contrary, they simply want to have confidence in the plan that will be realized. There is consensus around the problem that Lower Manhattan will continue to be prone to damaging flooding, and there is consensus around the need to physically modify East River Park so that this coastal sliver of land can do as much protecting of the city as possible. But local stakeholders were not involved in the creation of the current plan, and have been deprived of essential information, so they don’t trust it.
Which is why now is the time to pause. No one thinks this project is easy. That’s why every detail of it must stand up to scrutiny. It’s still possible to make the ESCR reflect current engineering best practices while also obtaining buy-in from locals, which is a necessity, not a nicety.
The previous administration conducted community engagement to the apparent satisfaction of stakeholders. In recent years, however, residents have been far less informed. When residents ask for information, they might receive a fully redacted report. In a democracy, you don’t make a case for public works based on top secret documents.
The ESCR is a complex project. Numerous government agencies are participating, reflecting the tangle of land, fill, utilities, estuary, harbor, landscape, climate, traffic, real estate, residential, health and recreational issues that impact the design and engineering of such an undertaking. To cite just a few of many unanswered questions: What is the true impact of ESCR on Manhattan’s aged sewerage system, which during heavy rains currently dumps raw sewage into the rivers via combined sewer outflows (CSOs)? Do we know enough about toxic waste areas located alongside the park, including NYCHA property, and how the plan does or does not respond to them? What effect does city Comptroller Scott Stringer’s rejection of a major ESCR contract have?
Let the mayor chart a new course, with an innovative approach — for example, a large-scale, multi-step workshop involving the city’s urban planners and existing plans, numerous community members, and expert engineers and designers from global cities. Involve Eric Adams and his team. Take six months to a year. Emerge with all parties confident in a “best in class” solution that the affected neighborhoods will support rather than resent.
De Blasio won many over by expressing determination on behalf of lower-income New Yorkers. Yet that’s exactly who will most feel this root shock — the loss felt by residents of a place when parts of it disappear due to outside forces. We humans need our metaphorical roots as much as trees need their real ones.
Loew is a journalist in New York, and creator of the short film ”No Man’s Land,” set in now-closed Stuyvesant Cove Park.
Copyright © 2022, New York Daily News
Copyright © 2022, New York Daily News