Wasting Our Money

Phase I of the Department of Parks & Recreation's redevelopment of the Ridgewood Reservoir includes a huge waste of taxpayer's money. As I mentioned in a previous posting, some of the lighting, pathway and fencing plan call for the replacement of the existing 7' high perimeter fences with 4' fences. That brilliant design concept would, essentially, allow open season on the forested and wetland basins to anyone desiring to climb over the fence. A closer examination of the design reveals another money wasting element.

Between basins 1 & 2 and 2 & 3 are a pair of pathways that were designed as maintenance roads when the reservoirs were in active use. The edges of those paths are lined with wrought iron coping fences. The parks department design for Phase I calls for the clearing and development of a walking path with limited seating between basins 2 & 3. In general, this is a good idea. Unfortunately, rather than just clearing the vines off of the existing 1/2 mile of coping fences, they want to completely remove it and replace it with a modern steel fence.

Somehow, the original, historic 19th century wrought iron coping fences managed to survive, intact. There are several short sections that appear to be missing, however, on close inspection those pieces can be seen either covered by dirt on the path or on the stone retaining wall in the basin interior. How many places in New York City can one still find 19th century fences at a public works site? I'm guessing none.

During the two World Wars many of the old fences were melted down and used for artillery or other war-related needs. Somehow, the fences designed by the Brooklyn Water & Sewer Works over 150 years ago escaped that fate. Now Adrian Benepe wants to just cut them all down and toss them into a landfill. For what? I'd like to see the cost comparison between the current design, which calls for removal and replacement, with a plan which just removes the vegetation from the fences and restores the missing sections. I'd also like to know (as would most NYC taxpayers) why Mark Morrison and Associates made no attempt to save the historic fences and incorporate them into their design.

All too often in New York City, planners and developers see no need for preserving our city's history. Had it not been for the ambition plans of the Brooklyn Water & Sewer Works and their vision of a clean water supply for the City of Brooklyn, we would not have seen the rapid growth and expansion of, what was once considered, the largest city in the United States.

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Parks Department Final Design

After nearly 2 years of community input, budget cuts and political wrangling, the Department of Parks & Recreation has submitted a final "Phase 1" design plan for the Ridgewood Reservoir to the Design Commission. Phase 1 only calls for improvements to the lighting and pathways surrounding the reservoir basins. It is clear from viewing the Powerpoint slideshow and listening to reaction from Queens Community Board 5 that the parks department pretty much ignored most of the community's input. I've converted the slideshow to a PDF file that can be downloaded here.

There are several areas of contention regarding the design, the most obvious being the height of the perimeter fences.

Since the start of the input process the parks department, namely Queens Commissioner Lewandowski and Park Administrator Kuha, have claimed that safety was their primary concern. Many of us commend them on their efforts to have openings in the existing 7' high chainlink fence repaired regularly and helping to increase patrols in the area. Homeless encampments in the basins, makeshift paintball areas and other illegal activities have been eliminated in the forested wetlands within the basins. In June, when the organization "World Science Festival" requested permission to host a bioblitz in the basins it was denied on grounds that it was too dangerous for people to scale down the basin embankments or walk around in the interiors. So why has Commission Lewandowski and Ms. Kuha given approval to a design that calls for removing the 7' high fence and replacing it with a 4' high fence? Was all their talk about safety just designed to keep people away from the reservoirs and create a negative image of the area? I suppose if you want to destroy "unique natural habitats" without any opposition the first thing you would want to do is make people think that it is a danger to the public. Does the parks department actually believe that people aren't going to jump over the fence to access the "dangerous" basins? And if anyone has difficulty climbing the fence, the proposed lighting design has the lampposts inline with the fences making for a convenient stepladder. Besides the obvious negative impact this will have on basins 1 and 3, there have been dozens of news articles posted over the decades about people drowning in the reservoir (basin 2 is a lake).

In Prospect Park an area call the Ravine was restored over an 8 year period. Tens of millions of dollars were spent on plantings, erosion control and other landscape repairs & improvements. When it was opened to the public, a 4' fence had been installed to prevent people from destroying the restored forest and waterway. Here is what happened; Fences were (and continue to be) climbed over or broken outright. In less than a year, much of the beautiful restoration was reversed. Understory plantings have been destroyed, the forest floor is badly eroded, compacted trails crisscross much of the forest, there are homeless encampments, parties, people having sex and the tons of trash. You can view some images of the destruction here. If Commissioner Lewandowski goes ahead with the plan for a low fence, she can expect the same or worse, since it is difficult for law enforcement to patrol the basin interiors.

There are also issues with the lighting plan. The design calls for nearly tripling the number of lampposts surrounding the basins. Another safety issue? Not likely as Highland Park and Ridgewood Reservoir have very low crime. In fact, according to NYPD statistics, it is much safer than Prospect Park. I don't think any other city park has lighting spaced so close. Another waste of money is the fact that the design calls for placing the lighting on the inside of the path and, rather than burying a single electrical line along the inside of the path, running it along the outside edge, with each lighting fixture then needing to have a separate lead splitting off from the outside of the path. Vincent Arcuri, the president of Queens Community Board 5, is a licensed electrician and pointed out this waste of money. Again, community voices were ignored.

The access path between basins 1 and 2 will not be available for public use. The path between basins 2 and 3, however, will be cleaned up and observation points created. This pathway will only be opened during specific hours and secured behind a short length of 7' fencing. There will be some seating added here. No additional seating or exercise stations (requested by the community) will be installed around the perimeter of the basins. Another design issue that was contested by the community board was the removal of a flight of stairs and access at the northeast corner of basin 1 near the Jackie Robinson Parkway service road. In this design feature anyone coming to the park from the area of Cypress Avenue and Cypress Hills Street wouldn't have an access point. It was in this area that many suggested Access-a-Ride vehicles or school buses pick-ups and drop offs. The department of parks wants, instead, to use this area only as an electronic card access point only for NYPD and park maintenance vehicles.

It is unclear to me whether the Department of Parks & Recreation had a design already in mind when they began the process of public input or if the parks commissioner just overruled any designs that included community recommendations. Either way, there is little question that the democratic process for this project has been seriously compromised. The community boards are preparing a joint statement and letter to the City Comptroller which I will post here shortly.



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HPRRA Meeting

The next meeting of the Highland Park-Ridgewood Reservoir Alliance will be tomorrow evening, September 10th, 2009 at 7pm. Steve Fiedler of Queens Community Board 5 will show the Department of Parks & Recreation's final design presentation for the first phase of construction around the reservoir.

The meeting will be held at:

Ridgewood Democratic Club
6070 Putnam Street


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Directions to The Ridgewood Democratic Club at 6070 Putnam Street. The
entrance is the first door on Stier Place

From Brooklyn:
Take Eastern Parkway until it ends at Bushwick Avenue.
Make a right turn onto Bushwick Avenue and move to the left lane.
Bear left onto the Jackie Robinson Parkway (formerly Interboro)
Exit at Cypress Hills Street (2nd exit)
At the top of the exit, make a left onto Cyrpress Hills Street
At the bottom of the hill make a left onto Cooper Avenue
Make a right at the 5th block (62nd Street)
62nd street ends in 2 blocks at Myrtle Ave
Make a left turn onto Myrtle and the make a right turn (about 50 feet) onto Fresh Pond Road (just at the end of the underpass; Fresh Pond starts at Myrtle and there is a carpet store on the right)
About 1/4 mile, 1 block after the M train station, Putnam Street is on the left.
It’s one block after the train station

From Manhattan:
Take the LIE
Exit to The Grand Central Parkway East (towards LI)
Stay in the right lane and exit onto the Jackie Robinson Parkway (formerly
Interboro)
Exit at Cypress Hills Street
At the top of the exit, make a right onto Cypress Hills Street
At the bottom of the hill make a left onto Cooper Avenue
Make a right at the 5th block (62nd Street)
62nd street ends in 2 blocks at Myrtle Ave
Make a left turn onto Myrtle and the make a right turn (about 50 feet) onto Fresh Pond Road (just at the end of the underpass; Fresh Pond starts at Myrtle and there is a carpet store on the right)
About 1/4 mile, 1 block after the M train station, Putnam Street is on the left.
It’s one block after the train station

From The Bronx:
Take the Triborough to the Grand Central Parkway and follow directions above
Parking can be sometimes be difficult in the area

By Subway:
Take the M train to the Fresh Pond Station or the L train to Myrtle Avenue and
then go upstairs and take the M to the Fresh Pond Station
Walk one block to Putnam and then left onto Putnam.

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