Advocate Groups Working For The Waterfront
BY GEORGINA YOUNG-ELLIS

Those of us who reside in Astoria and Long Island City can consider ourselves uncommonly lucky to have access to acres and acres of waterfront parks. Fortunately, those green spaces have advocates, working hard for their protection and improvement. Karen Overton, transition coordinator for the Astoria/LIC Catalyst Project of Partnerships for Parks, is one of those advocates, working with groups like Transportation Alternatives, Green Shores NYC (formerly the Astoria- Long Island City Waterfront Parks Alliance) and the Long Island City Community Boathouse towards improving access to the area's waterfront parks and making them safer and more beautiful.

One of Overton's goals is to present a proposal to the local community boards for the upgrading of the Queens East River Waterfront Greenway, which stretches along the waterfront parks. She states that at the moment the agencies in charge of the Greenway, City Planning, Parks and Recreation and the Department of Transportation, do not have any one person or committee coordinating the project and therefore it has no champion within those organizations. Her idea, and that of the advocate groups, is to create a standardized model of all city greenways so that they all have the same signage, lights, color themes and so forth. Among other improvements, they envision upgrading the Greenway from what is essentially a painted-on bike lane to a buffered zone separated from dangerous roadways by trees, bushes, or some other tangible barrier and making pedestrian crossings into the waterfront parks safer.

The advocate organizations want to get citizens involved, and plan to do just that with surveys, events and other outreach measures. One of these events, a waterfront celebration called the Community Visioning Forum, will take place on May 17 at Rainey Park at Vernon Boulevard and 34th Avenue. According to Overton, this event will be a fun and entertaining way for advocates to gather together the public's vision for their waterfront. Socrates Sculpture Park staff will involve participants in making origami fish on which they will write their wishes for their waterfront parks. The fish will be attached to a large strip of blue fabric representing the river and later collected.

"I Fish NY" will also be on hand with fishing equipment to provide instruction and advice. There will be live instrumental music and information about recycling and other community programs. The Helping Hands Student Club of the Baccalaureate H.S. will create a banner for the event, made up of a montage of Andy Warhol style prints, which will feature their own vision for the waterfront.

The Long Island City Community Boathouse will join in the celebration that day by kicking off their free kayaking program at Hallet's Cove. This program extends every Sunday until October as the weather allows. Overton pointed out that the city Department of Parks and Recreation has just recently inaugurated NYC Water Trails, a string of launch sites, including the one at Hallet's Cove, giving residents of the city even more access to their waterways. A permit is required for kayaking and canoeing. More information about NYC Water Trails and downloadable permits can be found at www.nycgovparks.org. For more information about the Greenway and the May 17 Community Visioning Forum, visit astoriawaterfront.org.