From AM-NY:The $170 million construction cost for the park has been taken of, with the city putting up $98 million, the federal government committing $22 million and the Friends of the High Line and others footing the rest of the bill.
However, the city will have to come up with 30 percent of the park’s annual $2 million to $3 million operating budget. And the Friends, which will oversee the 6.7-acre open space, is responsible for the remaining portion.
Hammond would not specify how much his group has already raised but said that they are aggressively working to secure next year’s budget through membership dues and other donations.
If the similarly membership-based Central Park Conservancy is any indication, the Friends could face a drop off in fundraising in 2010 because of the economy.
5 comments:
The highline is a project approved that insured political support for those pols involved.
This project benefit few if any citizens on the whole except for those real estate developers and property owners next to the highline. Try proposing this in or for Forest Hills - Glendale's overhead section of abondoned tracks!
They have:
Rockaway Beach Branch GreenwayI actually think they should reactivate the tracks for subway service and connect the Queens Boulevard line with the Rockaways. It would relieve congestion on Cross Bay/Woodhaven Blvd., which has become unbearable thanks to all the development in Rockaway and South Queens.
The people living near the tracks would fight it tooth and nail, but they actually have little legal recourse. The tracks aren't "abandoned," but "deactivated," meaning the city can restore service on them at will. If you bought property adjoining the right-of-way, you should have realized this was a possibility.
Still, I doubt anything, rail or trail, will be built on these tracks. Why do something to benefit the masses when it interferes with your own narrow self-interests?
Maybe the Feds and Bloomie should have been pushing for money to reactivate this Rockaway Branch to accommodate the lion's share of the million more people that will be shoehorned into Queens and reactivate a viable mass transit option rather than building a vanity project in Manhattan and pushing for congestion pricing?
I live in FH and wish the city would either activate it or turn it into a park. Do something with that eyesore!
Definitely reactivate the Rockaway line. We need all the public transportation that we can get.
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