WHY WRECK A PARK?
East River Park is New York City at its finest. We cannot let it be destroyed.
By Matt Sweeney
About eight years ago my life as a musician in New York changed radically for the better when I started running in East River Park.
The park’s 1.2 mile river promenade rolls by dreamy historic buildings, lush gardens, fountains, past tracks and football fields, under the Williamsburg Bridge, past one thousand massive mature trees, trippy sculptures, playgrounds, and an iconic bandshell immortalized in the essential urban document “Wild Style.” A run, or a walk, in East River Park can feature freestyle DJ’s, salsa percussionists, smoky birthday BBQ’s, a sonorous lone tuba player, the pop and shouts of community baseball and softball games. I’ve seen old men catch huge fish, watched hawks plunge down and catch field mice, heard some of the best music of my life, mourned loved ones and celebrated being alive with my partner who credits running in East River Park as the foundation for her sobriety. With all of this action, the river’s magic light and vermilion views of Brooklyn and the East Side’s bridges are simply a bonus.
East River Park is where I trained for touring with Iggy Pop, memorizing his catalogue on daily four mile runs. Where I whisper melodies into my iPhone, and where I later listen to studio mixes of those completed songs.
At this point most of the tunes I write, record or perform come from the park.
East River Park isn’t a tourist destination — it’s a place for people in this neighborhood to participate in life. Sports. Music. Eating. Tai Chi. Quiet reflection. Decompression. Working it out. It is a place to feel safe and sane.
In spite of the fact that real estate listings use East River Park proximity to lure the hip and well off, plenty of Manhattanites don’t even know it exists because the main entrances are located next to public housing on the FDR drive. It’s tucked away. There are no Shake Shakes or vendors of any kind, except for maybe the gentleman who sells flavored ices from a cart on the corner of 10th Street and Avenue D, near the north entrance.
Prior to COVID, most of the park’s users were local: families who reside in public housing on its borders, seniors from Chinatown, young parents, families from Jewish Orthodox communities, with a sprinkling of local “artist types” and skateboarders.
When the virus shut down the East Village’s fancy gyms, East River Park got a giant influx of New Yorkers who’d previously found the park inconvenient to get to. These new visitors may have noticed flyers and signs saying “SAVE THIS PARK.”
Because in 2018, under the guise of “flood protection,” Mayor DeBlasio and developers announced a massive $1.45 BILLION dollar plan to destroy East River Park, citing, but not showing, a “value engineering report.” No details were given. Bulldozers appeared, trees got tagged, soil samples taken.
In response, East River Park Action formed and organized protests and calls to action. Hearing testimonials from people who’ve lived by the park all their lives revealed to me what a lifeline the park has always been to the generations of communities that surround it. It was humbling.
In the last 2 years 14,000 people signed East River Park Action’s petition to stop this destructive plan. Two thousand of these signees are NYCHA residents: people who live directly on the park like the residents of Baruch Houses, which 68 percent LatinX, 12 percent Black, 16 percent Asian; and 2 percent white. More than a third live below the poverty line; more than a quarter have a disability. All of these people’s lives will be needlessly impaired by the destruction of the park.
East River Park is where New York City’s very own leaders are raised, an essential sanctuary for children, grandparents, poets, gardeners, prayer groups, dancers, scientists, students, pets, painters, community organizers, entrepreneurs, athletes, team captains. It is where real New York City culture lives.
All of this is to be destroyed, for a vague, secretive plan.
Why has this story not been covered in major news outlets? Why haven’t the voices of the people most closely connected to the park been heard?
East River Park Action keeps demanding answers. And earlier this year, their work revealed that the “2018 Engineering Report” is in fact NONEXISTENT, via the Freedom Of Information Act.
There never was a report.
Please read their findings, here: https://eastriverparkaction.org/2021/01/09/no-value/
The scale of both this duplicity and its potential damage is shocking and sickening. There has to be a plan that doesn’t necessitate wiping out the park. The next mayor of New York must commit to this.
That’s why I’m writing this piece.
Those us who were in the city every day during the pandemic know that parks may be the most important aspect of urban living, for our good health, for people of different backgrounds coming together. When life and the city’s usual beatings had knocked most of the hope out of me, running in East River Park reengaged my brain and body with the real city. That park saved my ass and my mind.
The poet Eileen Myles, one of NYC’s greatest voices, has been fighting for East River Park as well, I’ve recently found out. But they’re the only public figure I’m aware of who’s telling the rest of the city about the situation.
I am excited to see New York come back from this crisis, to see communities and businesses thrive again. But the city’s livelihood will be fatally compromised if all New Yorkers don’t stick up for places like East River Park. I don’t say that just because I live and work nearby. Rather, it’s because I live and work nearby that I’ve learned that this is true.
Save East River Park. Save New York City.
Matt Sweeney is a musician and producer who lives in the East Village.
