Governor Hochul will continue Cuomo's High Line boondoggle

 

Gothamist 

The Empire State Development Corporation — the state's main development arm — will pay $20 million of the estimated $50 million price tag, a spokesperson for Hochul confirmed. The rest will be privately funded by Brookfield Properties and Friends of the High Line, with the Port Authority contributing the land.

Like much of Cuomo's developer-friendly plans for Midtown, the extension has attracted scrutiny. It will bring the High Line directly into the arms of Brookfield's new seven-million-square-foot mixed-use development, likely benefitting the developer substantially.

In a statement, Brookfield Properties Executive Vice President Sabrina Kanner praised the "vibrant gateway connecting Moynihan Train Hall directly to the entirety of the High Line and the new West Side."  

The state has also been accused of prioritizing the posh park, while ignoring critical safety and quality-of-life issues on the pedestrian-hostile streets below. The Port Authority has long used the area for construction staging and parking.

Yet another bright idea!

From Curbed:

The New York Post reports that the MTA is seeking to revamp a section of disused railroad tracks in Long Island City, and has asking for community input on a park that could look somewhat similar to the High Line.

An MTA spokesman confirmed that the agency has released a Request For Expressions of Interest (RFEI) for the area as it explores all the options of what to do with this parcel of land. When this short stretch of railway, which the MTA calls the Montauk Cutoff, was in use, it "connect[ed] the LIRR's Lower Montauk Branch, which runs along the Newtown Creek, to the Sunnyside and Arch Street Yards to the north," according to the RFEI. But since the Cutoff isn't being used by the MTA anymore, they want to find a way to reuse it:

Specifically, the MTA is seeking expressions of interest from businesses, nonprofits, community groups, and individuals with innovative adaptive reuse concepts, and detailed implementation and operating plans for those concepts. These concepts can include, but are not limited to, public open space, urban farming, or museum or sculpture garden space.

But there are some conditions for groups who want to submit plans; namely, they must be able to provide access points for any plans that include public space; they must plan to bring utilities, like electricity and water, to the site; and they must plan for site maintenance. It's obviously too early to tell what may come of this RFEI, but there's no arguing that a park could be a boon for the area. Mitch Waxman, a neighborhood activist who leads tours of the nearby Newtown Creek, told the Post, "This could be a magnificent bit of green infrastructure."

Why would you want an elevated park among polluting factories? (Unless you plan to convert the land into condos and want a draw to make idiot yuppies spend millions to live there?)

Fake Buddhist monks live in Flushing

Angel Chevrestt, NY Post

From the NY Post:

Bands of beggars dressed like Buddhist monks have invaded the High Line and other city parks, demanding upwards of $40 from tourists — and officials are fed up.

The behavior of the phony ­Himalayan holy men has been anything but heavenly in Bryant Park. One was spotted last week swiping a plastic water bottle from a clueless sidewalk vendor.

Other faux friars were spotted on smoking breaks, trying to hide the unchaste behavior near a subway entrance. Two napped on library ledges.

The masquerading monks are largely Chinese nationals who return to Flushing flophouses with their day’s earnings, sometimes changing out of their robes on the subway, before gathering at a local restaurant for a meal that usually includes alcohol, according to one observer.

Real Buddhist monks typically shun toxins including cigarettes and alcohol.

Public-private partnerships hurt the general public

From the NY Times:

The Central Park Conservancy manages $220 million in assets, and has four officials who make more money than the city parks commissioner, Veronica M. White. At a High Line fund-raiser, a host held aloft a million-dollar check and asked for a match. Another $1 million check was written on the spot.

At the other end of this spectrum, the cracked path around the Shore Park-Verrazano Narrows offers an exercise in horizontal mountain biking. At Flushing Meadows-Corona Park children play in dry wading pools and lake paths are unnavigable without machetes.

Prospect Park occupies a middle ground. It has overseen a stunningly beautiful reconstruction of its lake side. It also rents out its Audubon Center on weekends to the wedding-bar mitzvah-birthday crowd.

Our lame duck mayor, Michael R. Bloomberg, has started to turn off his charitable money shower. His foundation informed the Prospect Park Alliance that it intended to end its quarter-million dollar annual contribution. (Ms. Lloyd declined to discuss this.)

Those who defend privatization are candid. Ask about inequity and they talk of commodities; the emerald brilliance of Central Park draws tourists. The High Line is a brooch in the luxury transformation of Chelsea.

As for Flushing Meadows? When told that partisans hoped to transform a homely asphalt-ringed fountain into a grass-edged lake, John Alschuler Jr., co-chairman of the Friends of the High Line, offered an exasperated sigh. In his day job, he lobbies to place a U.F.O.-size professional soccer stadium in the midst of that Queens park.

Cities, he said, no longer pay for parks properly. Such exuberant hopes will not be realized in my life, he said, or that of my child. Find a corporate sponsor, he suggested.

So condescension passes as realism.

Holly Leicht of New Yorkers for Parks is a vigorous parks advocate, and would demand transparency and accountability from conservancies. But she would not upset the conservancy lords until the Parks Department is properly financed and revamped.

This feels backward. Former Police Commissioner Bill Bratton transformed a hidebound Police Department in months; why demand less of the Parks Department?

Could the Queensway work as both a park and transit?

From AM-NY:

Both QueensWay and the High Line involve former rail rights of way but, functionally, they are very different. The High Line was a short freight line, with no real potential, then or now, for passenger use.

The Rockaway Beach Branch, however, did serve passengers, and the right of way still has great transportation potential. It shouldn't be used only for a linear park and food stands. This irreplaceable, publicly owned land could also serve to reduce auto traffic and increase mobility in the local neighborhoods.

This could be achieved by using the Queens right of way for a modern, context-sensitive, grade-separated bus rapid transit service with connections to area bus and rail lines, including Metropolitan Avenue, Atlantic Avenue, other major crossroads and the Queens Boulevard subway. This type of quick, reliable, environmentally friendly rapid bus system has been in service for years in many cities, including Pittsburgh, Los Angeles and Miami.

At Atlantic Avenue in Woodhaven, the bus rapid transit station could connect to a rehabilitated Woodhaven Station on the LIRR Brooklyn line. In this way, Queens would gain the public transportation service that was denied it when the AirTrain to Kennedy Airport was built.

Both sustainable elements -- parks and high-quality transit -- could be achieved by the time-shared use of a single "way" within this right of way: transit during weekday peak periods and a pedestrian-bicycle trail at all other times.

The Queens High Line vs. the Queens Express

Council bails out High Line charity - again

From DNA Info:

The High Line is set to get a whopping $5 million in extra cash from the city — more than almost any other park — even as it reported pulling in $85 million in private funds and established a lucrative concessions deal, city records show.

The High Line cash, appropriated by the City Council as part of the 2013 budget's capital expenditures, will be paid to the Friends of the High Line for use building the estimated $90 million construction on its third section.

The move has some park advocates questioning why the city is set to spend on the High Line such a large part of its $105 million, 2013 appropriations for 142 park projects — when the taxpayer money could go to other city parks that have greater infrastructure needs and fewer wealthy donors.

Geoffrey Croft of NYC Park Advocates, called the difference in city allotments to park space discouraging — pointing to several other parks that could use city cash for improvements, including Ferry Point Park in the Bronx and Highbridge Park in Washington Heights.

"When you consider the dramatic needs of other parks that need a tremendous amount of help, the disparity is unbelievable," he said.

"The High Line and Brooklyn Bridge Park, they’re exciting new additions to the parks system," Croft said. "But clearly that money could be used to take care of longstanding needs in other, poorer communities. But it’s not a priority."

Let's recall that Friends of the High Line was supposed to raise the money for their tourist playground-in-the-sky PRIVATELY. But they failed, so Christine Quinn saw to it that they got bailed out. Again. Meanwhile, parks in Queens look like crap or won't get built because "we have no money."

EDC & Parks officials accepted bribes; bribemaker in the clear

From the NY World:

Free dinners, free luncheons and barbecues, even a free $4,000 honeymoon in Istanbul – three city officials overseeing construction of Manhattan’s High Line received these and more from the chief contractor on the project. The company, Kiska Construction Corporation, had more than $60 million in contracts with the city’s Economic Development Corporation to “pretty much build 75 percent of the High Line,” Kiska vice president Alp Baysal told The New York World, “from the structure holding it all up to the finishing touches on the rails.”

In 2008, the officials who took those goodies from Kiska received something else in addition to full stomachs and a hotel room: thousands of dollars in fines from the city’s Conflicts of Interest Board (COIB).

City employees are barred from receiving gifts in excess of $50. Yet the arm of the city’s ethics law does not reach to private citizens, developers, contractors and companies, like Kiska, which repeatedly induce city officials to commit ethics violations. Kiska continues to be eligible to serve as a contractor on city projects, including the future third phase of the High Line, to be built north of 30th Street. Planning for that final section of the elevated park is now underway.

Journalism school students 1, Mainstream Media 0. (Too busy rewriting Bloomberg administration press releases.) But next time, name names. Allow me to assist this time:

Michael Bradley

Leonard Greco

Nazir Mir

Info comes from New York Law School

The Queens High Line?

From the Times Ledger:

An anonymous group of architects is working on yet another plan to transform a stretch of abandoned train tracks in Queens into the borough’s version of The High Line, according to a South Ozone Park activist.

“There are a bunch of architects who have been working locally,” said Anandi Premlall, who has been publicly advocating for a park on the abandoned Rockaway Branch of the Long Island Rail Road, which cuts a rusty, overgrown swath through several neighborhoods in the borough.

Premlall, who would not name the architects but said she was meeting with them at the end of the month, was inspired by the Manhattan park, which is a greenspace built on another set of elevated subway tracks.
Israel Center of Conservative Judaism

The premise for the Queens version would be the same, according to Premlall, since the old LIRR line has not been in use since the 1950s, when the railroad company sold the tracks to various city agencies.

Art project raises interesting questions

From the Daily News:

A City Council member on Monday blasted the kooky Manhattan skywriting art project that startled scores of New Yorkers.

"The arts are supposed to generate conversation but not apprehension and fear," said Councilman Peter Vallone Jr. (D-Queens), who heads the Council's Public Safety Committee.

Artist Kim Beck chose three slogans she had gleaned from advertising billboards and hired a plane to skywrite them. The project was sponsored by Friends of the High Line, the nonprofit behind the wildly popular elevated park.

One mysterious message, "Last Chance," sparked terrorism fears in some New Yorkers, who took to Twitter to express their bewilderment.

Vallone called the high-flying stunt "plain stupid - no pun intended."

Organizers of the project defended it.

The High Line's website says the park's public art projects receive taxpayer money from the city and state. The group received $75,000 this year from the City Council for public programming and other uses, records show.

But the park's website was changed Monday to specify that the skywriting project was privately funded.

This is interesting. Why are taxpayers funding Friends of the High Line, when they defaulted on their agreement to privately raise the funds necessary for the maintenance of the park if it was built? And what is the Friends of the High Line doing funding "art" when they haven't paid their debt for the park yet? Last time I checked they were threatening to tax the businesses along the strip. I don't think the skywriting is the looniest part of this story...

High Line killing small businesses

From Urbanite:

Many of the high hopes that small-business owners had for the High Line have fallen hard.

The lush green artery is killing off a chunk of New York’s entrepreneurial and gritty industrial past as the real estate developers, landlords and other profiteers cash in on the city’s latest chic attraction, some small- business owners said.

The elevated park has been widely praised since its first leg opened in 2009, developing into a major tourist attraction. But few of the 2 million annual visitors likely hold the opinion of the owner D & R Auto Parts.

“The High Line sucks,” he griped to amNewYork. He said he would “rather have my knees cut off” than take a stroll along the sylvan pathway, as his profits have dropped 35% to 40% since it opened. Prior to the 2005 zoning changes that encouraged development to help the High Line, the area was a sparsely populated urban backwater, filled with low-rise buildings, artist lofts, auto shops and small industry. Now it brims with luxury housing, high-end boutiques and tourists from all over the globe.

Local businesses — “the marble countertop guy, the bar, the restaurant” — are vanishing as a result of the “perfect storm” caused by High Line-related gentrification, the increasing cost of operating a small business, the city’s stepped-up enforcement of revenue-generating activities such as ticket writing and inspections, and the recession, the auto-parts vendor lamented. He refused to be quoted by name, saying he feared retribution by Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Other neighborhoods need parks too

From the Politicker:

Whether the High Line’s pristine restoration has ruined its allure as one of the city’s last wild escapes remains a matter of some dispute. But as the city opened the second section this week, the celebrated rail trellis has come to be seen by some critics as a symbol of the new New York for the Bloomberg era, a place that privileges high-end enchantments and requires steady dollops of fashion, celebrity and financial philanthropy for anything to move the municipal bureaucracy.

“The biggest blockbuster opening of the summer isn’t The Hangover Part II—it is the High Line Part 2,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg said at a ceremonial groundbreaking this week, where he announced a $5 million gift to the park from the Tiffany Foundation and a matching gift from the philanthropists Donald Pels and Wendy Keys. “And when I say blockbuster I mean every block from 20th to 30th Street!”

“All the High Line really proves is that wealthy, connected people simply have better access to government and are able to do this kind of thing,” said Geoffrey Croft, executive director of New York City Park Advocates. “I give everyone a lot of credit for seeing this through, but let’s be honest—I’ve been working for years and years to get a tiny piece of park land out in Maspeth, and these guys are able to get a $100 million park in a very short period of time.”

Queens residents may be able to shop more easily in the meatpacking district

From the NY Times:

If the third section [of the High Line] is completed, it will end near the terminus of the extended No. 7 subway line, said Robert K. Steel, the deputy mayor for economic development. People could ride the subway from Queens, then walk the High Line through Chelsea to the meatpacking district, said Mr. Steel, who recently became a resident of Chelsea, just a block from the High Line.

So who along the 7 line in Queens is dying to do this? A show of hands, please...

Apparently we have money to extend the High Line

From the NY Post:

More High Line is on the way.

With 2 million people having visited Manhattan's park in the sky since it opened last June, officials at the elevated green space say they're now on track to complete a new, second section of the High Line in time for an opening next spring.

During a tour of the new section, stretching from 20th to 30th streets, enough of the construction has been completed to visualize the array of quirky new landscapes and attractions that will extend High Line Park to a full mile in length.

The most over-the-top feature begins at 25th Street, where work has begun on a "Woodland Flyover" that will lift park-goers 15 feet above the old rail trestle through a stand of magnolia trees.

Sounds nice. Who's paying for this considering the Friends of the High Line couldn't foot the bill for the first section as they had promised?

When the best case scenario doesn't happen

From the NY Observer:

On May 17, Governor Paterson and several other officials and community leaders assembled on Manhattan's West Side for a ribbon cutting at Hudson River Park, the 5-mile-long strip of green space, converted piers and bike lanes along the Hudson River. They were on hand to christen the new (and growing) park's latest section, a 9-acre run that has a new skate park and gardens near West 24th Street.

It is, indeed, the season of parks: Earlier this spring, the long-planned Brooklyn Bridge Park opened its first section, a large pier; and the year-old High Line elevated park that runs through Chelsea is laying materials for its second phase, to open next year.

There's just one little nagging detail with these expanding parks: There's not enough money to fund their upkeep, and, for the most part, no one quite knows where it will come from.

All three parks were held up as gems of an economic development agenda in New York, as, theoretically, they were to be self-sustaining or close to it, with the private sector to pay for the ongoing operations. Yet the situation is one of classic overreach, as the administrations of Mayor Bloomberg and three governors put their faith in the panacea concept of the public-private partnership, pledging a win-win for all involved. The logic ran like this: New parks would be built; creative planning would open the floodgates to money from the private sector to fund maintenance year after year; and public balance sheets would be spared. The reality is far less heartwarming. The city and state are now grasping to find ways to make the parks work in the long term and are finding no answers that pass muster with the local communities and elected officials whose sign-off is needed. With this question mark hanging overhead, the fact that the groundbreakings continue-money continues to go into expansion-looks to be something of a reckless move, as officials are betting that some unspecified solution will indeed materialize at some future date.

Parks apologizes for High Line arrests

From A Walk in the Park:

On Saturday artists were allowed to sell their wares on the High Line without incident for the first time. The day before the Parks Department reversed its position which had resulted in three arrests. Their previous vending policy only permitted selling items which included designer muffins, exotic teas, coffee and gelato. Unlike the "expressive matter" vendors, commercial concessions bring in revenue to the city. The City is currently negotiating a sole source concession agreement with the Friends of the High Line (FOH) which would allow the group to keep revenue from items sold on the park property. Since its opening in the Spring, the City has allowed 29 different permitted commercial vendors on the High Line but no art vendors...

According to Mr. Lederman's account, Parks Commissioner Benepe started the meeting by apologizing for the arrests.

"Believe it or not, he said, ‘I guess we didn’t know what we were doing.’ And then he said, ‘We’d like to discuss this whole issue with you, and apologize to you for not returning your e-mails, your calls.’

“They told me, ‘We know you’re going to be going back there, and that’s not a problem, we’re not going to arrest you.’ Amazingly enough, they were very agreeable to the things I had to say, but the one thing they drew a line [saying], “That we’re not going to be able to do” — you won’t believe what it was," Mr. Lederman recalled.

“I said, ‘I would like you to write a letter that says artists have a First Amendment right to sell in the parks subject to the limitations in the Park rules.’ They said, ‘We cannot do that.’ Unbelievable. That’s already what the consent decree says and what the lawsuit says and what the laws of the City of New York say — that they wouldn’t do. It fits in with their whole agenda of trying to deny that this was a First Amendment case, which is nonsense.

Artist arrested on High Line again

Watch as 5 Parks police officers arrest artist Robert Lederman for no reason. Also arrested was Jack Nesbitt, who was taking the video. Both of these arrests were violations of the First Amendment.

A Walk in the Park has more.

Can't have artists on the High Line!

(Also note that 5 Parks officers is probably what Flushing Meadows, many times the size of the High Line, has on a good day.)

Artist suing city and Friends of the High Line

From the Villager:

Following his arrest on the High Line for selling art without a permit on Nov. 21, street-artist activist Robert Lederman is now working on his latest creation — a lawsuit for millions in damages that he plans to file against the Friends of the High Line and the city.

Meanwhile, the Friends of the High Line and the Parks Department are both being tighter-lipped than Tiger Woods, refusing to simply say whether it’s legal or illegal to vend art without a permit on the new elevated park.

Lederman said just 30 seconds after he had erected his display around 9 a.m., he was confronted by a High Line staff member. A few minutes later, he was surrounded by eight of them.

“All of them had High Line uniforms with High Line logos on them, baseball caps with High Line logos and walkie-talkies with High Line logos,” he said.

According to Geoffrey Croft, of NYC Park Advocates, an outspoken critic of the new park, these employees are known as High Line Rangers, and are paid for by Friends of the High Line.

Then at 3:30 p.m., a city Park Enforcement Patrol officer, whose nameplate read “B. Joseph” issued Lederman three noncriminal Environmental Control Board summonses: for disorderly conduct; “failure to comply with a direction prohibition on sign”; and “unauthorized/failure to have display comply with required permit.”

He showed the officer the newspaper articles on his lawsuit victories, and said the officer “seemed to believe it himself,” yet still wrote the tickets.

The PEP finally handcuffed him after he wouldn’t go away. Many tourists witnessed the arrest, Lederman added, noting some were standing with their “mouths open” in concern, as the officer and Rangers — wrongly — warned them it was illegal to videotape the arrest.

Artist arrested without cause on the High Line

Robert Lederman, president of the street artists rights group A.R.T.I.S.T. (Artists Response To Illegal State Tactics) was arrested on the 14th Street section of the Highline Park on Saturday, at approximately 3:30 PM. Lederman was issued 5 summonses, handcuffed and taken to the 6th Precinct by PEP (Park Enforcement Patrol) officers, after employees of the Highline Park called police. This is Lederman's 42nd arrest.

Lederman was on the Highline displaying and selling original fine art prints of his NYC scenes. Between 1994 and 2001 Lederman won 5 Federal lawsuits on street artists First Amendment rights. Among them was a 2001 Federal Appeals court ruling (Lederman et al v Giuliani), which established that visual artists can sell in any NYC park without a license or Parks permit, based on First Amendment freedom of speech.

Summonses were issued for the following: Vending without a Park permit; failure to comply; disorderly conduct; failure to comply with directions of officers and unauthorized vending.

Lederman was released from the 6th Precinct around 6:30 PM and made the following statement:

"The Parks Department has done a very poor job of educating their employees about the legal issues involving First Amendment rights, artists and parks. Before any of these summonses were issued or any arrest was made I repeatedly explained to Highline employees and PEP officers that a court order was in effect and that artists freely and legally sold in all NYC Parks without a license or permit. I also showed them articles from the NY Times and NY Post describing this exact court order.

The wealthy people who paid to create the Highline seem to have forgotten that it is still a public park. The US Constitution remains in effect there, as do the street artists rights described in numerous 2nd circuit Federal Court orders. These court orders are constantly being violated by the Parks Department. This is a blatant example of contempt of court, false arrest and chilling of free speech in the name of privatization."

Street artist Federal court rulings

NY Times on Parks Dept artist permit ruling

NY Post on street artist Federal Court ruling

Geoffrey Croft
NYC Park Advocates
(212) 987-0565

High Line design is a liability for taxpayers

Costly 'trips' on High Line
By JAMES FANELLI and RICH CALDER, NY Post

Money had better grow on trees in the High Line Park, because the city's newest greenway is also its latest liability.

Less than five months old, the elevated promenade has become a major stumbling block. Pedestrians are tripping over raised concrete slabs meant to resemble train rails, and one has even filed a $2 million claim against the city.

Paula Shapiro, 66, said she broke her left ankle during an evening stroll along the path on June 21, two weeks after it opened, according to court papers.

The Gramercy Park resident was 246 feet north of the park's Gansevoort Street entrance when she tripped near a median of trees and flowers surrounded by "raised, uneven, depressed decorative concrete," her claim states.

And while Shapiro is the first pedestrian-turned-plaintiff at the $172 million park, she is not the first to fall, her lawyer said.

"She was told there had been accidents before," Jeffrey Pomerantz told The Post.

From Forgotten-NY:

to prevent baby carriages from entering the green areas (bikes have been proscribed on the High Line) metal lips have been placed at the edges of the park paths, to divide them from the plantings. Unfortunately, I nearly lost my footing a couple of times on these.

Hey folks, the good news is we'll get to pay a lot more in liability soon since the city is moving to acquire the rest of it!