There’s a new organization advocating for an often overlooked neighborhood park. We asked the founder, Michael Marino, for some background on Friends of Corlears Hook Park:
We are a small and newly formed group that was founded to help revitalize the Corlears Hook Park and make it a viable amenity to all. I founded the group after a call to State Senator Daniel Squadron’s office to complain about the condition and upkeep of the park. His office arranged a call with other area park groups and representatives from the Parks Department and Partnership for Parks to provide some guidance and advice to me as I started to get the Friends of CHP rolling. We have about 20 people on our list serve so far – in just under a month – so hopefully that will continue to grow. Earlier this month we worked with NYC Bark Club on a clean-up of the dog runs in the park and we will continue to partner with them until the dog runs are a place that where people are proud to bring their pets, NYC Bark Club has secured some funding for continued improvements to the dog runs. In addition we also want to advocate for re-opening of the comfort station in the park. So many teams use the fields in the park for games and practice and it’s always discouraging to walk through the park and see the kids in their team uniforms running into the bushes to relieve themselves. Of course we will also be focusing on greening the park with new plantings and weeding/clean-up projects (we are hoping to schedule another clean up project for November before winter rolls in). We’d also like to address park safety by having the lampposts that were destroyed by Hurricane Sandy finally repaired to bring more light into and around the park area at night.
Here’s a link to the group’s Facebook page.
this is what the beginning of gentrification looks like. not so ominous. but cleaning up the park is an invitation to outside people who have more money – move on in. soon enough, you’ve got a really nice park, but your neighbors are being forced out, and your rent keeps going up. unfortunately, it’s a no-win bind.
With all due respect, I think that’s kinda of a b.s. response RoBow. Nobody wants a neglected dirty park, not even poor people.
I have definitely noticed the lack of working lights at night. Good luck to these park improvers. Everyone, rich or poor, likes a nice park.
David, I don’t disagree with you, but that’s not what I said. Any idiot knows that everyone wants a nice, clean park with lots of amenities, but who gets them? Please look around at the evidence where parks got cleaned up, and all of a sudden they now close at certain times. Neglected parks got cleaned up, and are now surrounded by luxury residences. Parks that used to be the domain of democracy now have conservancies that dictate their rules. We can blame landlords and bars all we want, but until we look deeper, and at ourselves (and those who’ve left), as to what is creating the gentrification we all hate, we’ll never really address this issue. But I’m sure it’s much easier to take a pot-shot at this commenter.
People getting involved and being a squeaky wheel is what gets things changed I think. So to that end, I’m happy this group has formed. I think we are a long way from becoming central park.