This evening, a neighborhood non-profit, the Renaissance Economic Development Corp., will begin seeking community input about the transformation of a stretch of Forsyth Street.
The area they’re targeting runs alongside the Manhattan Bridge, between Division and Canal Streets. Home to a handful of fruit and vegetable vendors, the sidewalk and street are teeming with pedestrians and large delivery vehicles.
The organization, a division of Asian Americans for Equality, was accepted into the the NYC Plaza Program, an initiative to improve public spaces in all five boroughs.
Tonight, they’re kicking off a series of public meetings to find out what residents would like to see in the Forsyth Plaza. Here’s the starting point for the discussions, via a description of the project on the Department of Transportation’s web site:
The Forsyth Street plaza will provide additional sidewalk space along the western portion of Forsyth Street to enhance the street environment currently alongside and underneath the Manhattan Bridge. In addition, the project will create an upper plaza on a vacant portion of property adjacent the bridge’s off-ramp so that residents and cyclists traveling off the bridge can enjoy public open space that looks down upon Forsyth Street and the surrounding neighborhood. In total, the project provides up to 10,000 square feet of new public space.
The city has committed about $2 million to reconfiguring the sidewalk, and doing basic infrastructure work. It will be up to Renaissance to pay for other improvements to the plaza (such as benches, landscaping, etc).
Tonight’s town hall meeting will be held at P.S. 124, 40 Division Street, at 630pm.
