From the Times Newsweekly:
Plans for ballfields in the third basin of the Ridgewood Reservoir, long opposed by local residents and community groups, may be fading away, according to members of Community Board 5’s Parks Committee.
At a meeting held Monday, Sept. 24 at P.S. 68 in Glendale, Parks Committee Chairperson Steve Fiedler claimed that the state Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) is reviewing the site, citing a conversation with staff members from State Sen. Joseph Addabbo’s office.
Addabbo, in a phone interview with the Times Newsweekly, confirmed that the DEC, at his insistence, is going back to review a study of the site three years ago that stated that two out of the three basins that make up the reservoir meet state wetlands requirements.
“Protecting two-thirds of the wetland really doesn’t make sense,” he stated.
“That’s exactly what the city wants,” Fiedler stated at the Monday meeting, noting that the third basin is where the city had hoped to build ballfields. “I don’t believe it.”
“If it’s a point or two under the qualification for a wetland, it still has to be a wetland,” said Fiedler.
In addition, according to Board 5 District Manager Gary Giordano, Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s office is beginning to listen to resident requests that all three basins are left untouched.
“I had a meeting with him and people from Ridgewood and Maspeth,” he noted. “He said to me, ‘Gary, you still want that to be a nature preserve right?’ I said, ‘yes I do.’ He said ‘okay.’ So I think he is favorable toward that idea.”
5 comments:
Let
it be...............
I think that our faltering economy
has a lot to do with this.
It seems that a lot of grandiose plans
(both public and private)
that were being promoted around New York
have run into some major snags.
i would have to agree with #2. This has little to do with a change of heart and everything to do with the city destroying its finances.
Parks hasn't been proposing ballfields in the basin for years, i don't know why people are still saying this.
The only thing parks is doing now is a new fence and lighting.
Actually, Parks has been proposing a nature preserve in basins 1 and 2 and developing the 3rd. That's been the stated plan all along. They just never could get enough people to agree with it.
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