Parking Lot Could Be Green Space And Boat Launch
BY THOMAS COGAN

A computerized illustration shows part of the park and small boat launch that might be built on Newtown Creek at the end of Vernon Boulevard. In the near background the trees are Dawn Redwoods, said to be a hardy type in the urban atmosphere. In the far background is the Pulaski Bridge which would provide perhaps the best route to the isolated site.

Vernon Boulevard runs from Astoria Boulevard to Newtown Creek. Near the watery terminus, it passes over the Queens-Midtown Tunnel and is cut off from its last short stretch by tracks of the Long Island Rail Road, also reaching terminus not far away. Vernon Boulevard's end is actually a parking lot running from 53rd Avenue to Newtown Creek. On one side of the parking lot, 54th Avenue comes to an end where it meets the lot, and is diagonal to where 53rd Avenue also ends when it curves into the lot. Though isolated, this end point has a few small businesses on either side of the parking lot, three of them being Shelter Express (formerly Metro Clean Express), Vista Media and Tec Systems. A fair amount of traffic comes into and goes out of the lot each business day via 53rd and 54th Avenues.

Some people think it would be a fine place for a park.

These people believe that such a park could exist, indeed thrive, in harmony with the light industry operating at the end of Vernon Boulevard. During the summer, four informational meetings, open to the public and conducted by two groups, New Yorkers for Parks and the Newtown Creek Alliance, were held in Long Island City to explain how that might be done. The Vernon Boulevard park would actually be nothing more than a narrow strip forming the bank of the creek, and would not have much more depth than the concrete wall that stands at the end of the parking lot now. There would be a small promenade and seating area and, at a slightly lower level, a launch area for kayaks and other small craft. The parking lot would be transformed by certain "green" measures designed to control the toxic content of industrial and other runoff from the lot into the creek. What's more, the park would form a tandem of sorts with the park that's expected to be built directly across the creek in Greenpoint.

The Greenpoint park would be located at the end of Manhattan Avenue. At present, it is a fenced-in, chain-locked area containing heaps of dirt and rubble and what appears to be a loose pile of paving blocks, these being the only visible suggestion that such a vest-pocket park would ever be seen and appreciated by anyone looking out a window in the old brick factories nearby that now house the Greenpoint Manufacturing and Design Center. When completed, the Manhattan Avenue park might be reached from several parts of Brooklyn, or from Long Island City by anyone willing to hike over the Pulaski Bridge that spans the creek and approach it either by way of Eagle Street at the Greenpoint end of the bridge, or Ash Street, three blocks closer to the creek, at the base of a stairway from the bridge. Amatching stairway on the Long Island City side of the creek provides the most practical way for a walker to get to any park-like facility that could be built at the end of Vernon Boulevard. That stairway leads to 53rd Avenue and 11th Street, just beyond the railroad tracks that almost entirely block access to the last segment of the boulevard. A walk down 53rd Avenue brings one to the point where the avenue ends, curving into the parking lot that leads to the low concrete wall at the edge of the creek. With 54th Avenue also cutting into the lot and ending there, the result is a barely accessible destination, which at the moment comprises only a battered blacktop lot and the wall, on which is mounted an industrial real estate advertisement. In view of all that, it would seem that only the most visionary of persons could picture an eventual park and kayak launch.

But it could happen. Even now, there are intimations of a base of enthusiasts that would use the park and boat launch frequently, and ultimately transform the currently dreary industrial patch at the end of Vernon Boulevard into a thriving entity. People crossing the Pulaski Bridge on foot or by bicycle would learn of it and respond to it. These include bicyclists who now wander across the parking lot, going from 53rd to 54th Avenue or in the opposite direction, who would see such a park as a good place to visit, and kayakers and other boat people who ply the waters of the East River and Newtown Creek and who would discover that someone had built a park just for them.

Attendees of the summer meetings recognized the fact that any dream of a park and boating area at the end of Vernon Boulevard would have to accommodate the businesses on site and the lot, too. The response to that was a series of models for a park and boating area, displayed and explained by the designer, Jennifer Giarratana, a student at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard. She not only made new designs of the wall vicinity but also considered the parking lot, where the problem of storm water drainage had to be addressed. Alternate ideas were presented. One called for replacing the asphalt surface with a permeable one by laying in gravel where vehicle traffic was heavy and putting grass in the parking areas. The grass would grow within hard frames that could bear the weight of traffic, so the parking area would not be reduced to mud and the grass could continue to absorb storm water. Another plan was to filter storm water through catch basins carved beside existing curbs in the parking lot. A storm water filtration garden built at the end of the lot would be part of the new park area. This plan was generally the preferred one at the time the two were compared. Still another plan would place absorbent storm water swales in strategic places on the parking lot asphalt.

By the time of the last meeting, at the end of August, Giarratana had developed two "concepts" for the park area and boat launch, each one providing a terraced seating area, bicycle rack, a ramp to the boat launch and the launch itself, though with differing configurations. Fencing would separate the park area from the launch area, since the latter would be open to the water. One concept would put the park area seven feet above the water at low tide, three feet above at high, with the launch area five feet and one foot above high and low water, respectively; the other would put some of the launch area below the water at high tide. The fence material Giarratana proposed was a German product called X-tend that is all metal, yet remarkably plastic. She also suggested separating the park area from the parking lot, not only with conventional bollards but also with old tires (presumably cleaned up), giving the place an industrial touch, (too industrial, some complained). She also foresaw installation of several dawn redwood trees on the border of the parking lot and in the park area, identifying the dawn redwood as deciduous and calling it "a tough urban tree" that is salt tolerant, an advantage in the briny atmosphere of Newtown Creek.

Giarratana reminded her listeners that at the moment "this is only a concept", and it wouldn't be practical to make any plans for next summer that would include it. Besides the matter of official approval before anything can begin to be built, there remain important construction considerations. Electrical, gas and drainage lines lie just below the surface of the parking lot, and their positions determine how deep builders could go in the service of both the businesses on site and those seeking the pleasure of a small park and boat launch. The designers want to make it plain that they have both those parties in mind, and show their concern with a statement that has become a motto of the project: "This site should be a paradigm for mixing industry and open space, to the benefit of industry."