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Creating Open Space Takes Politics and Planning


high line
Photo by zinetv
Twenty years ago who would have imagined that an abandoned rail line in lower Manhattan would become one of the city's most prized parks?

In the 1970s, who could have predicted that in 2010, New Yorkers would take yoga classes on a lush lawn in Bryant Park, enjoy a lunch break in the middle of Broadway or bike to work along the Hudson River? With the restoration of so many parks and the creation of new ones like the High Line and Brooklyn Bridge Park, outdoor public spaces have become central to life in New York City in a way that hardly could have been imagined just a few decades ago.

A similar shift has happened around the country, from Atlanta to Chicago to Portland, Ore., paralleling the reversal of cities' fortunes over the past few decades. "Parks are back on the public agenda," writes park expert Peter Harnik in his new book, Urban Green: Innovative Parks for Resurgent Cities, which explores how to take advantage of this opportunity to weave more green into the urban grid.

Drawing on research into American city park systems by the Center for City Park Excellence at the Trust for Public Land, which he directs, Harnik shows how cities have created new parks despite formidable obstacles: lack of space; a shortage of money and conflicting priorities for spending it; disagreements over what to build and where it should go; and resistance to change by everyone from mothers wary of letting anyone other than students use school playgrounds to stormwater engineers unfamiliar with green infrastructure.

As the Bloomberg administration begins to gather public input for updating PlaNYC 2030, the city's sustainability plan, which calls for increasing open space, there are many lessons and ideas to be drawn from this optimistic book.

The Importance of Planning

According to Harnik, setting one abstract standard for how much parkland cities should have for a given population does not work for real cities. Every city needs to find its own balance between green space and the other elements that bring them to life, such as museums, theaters, restaurants, shopping and architecture. Even in crowded cities, he notes, some parks are underutilized. More important than simply opening up more space is creating the types of parks people want, in the places where they are most needed.

The key to success is a fair, inclusive and transparent master planning process based on an assessment and analysis of current conditions, needs, benefits and public interest and willingness to pay. "It doesn’t do any good to have an open process for soliciting input if the process for making decisions is then secretive, biased or preordained," he writes. The first half of Urban Green covers in detail how a successful planning process works.

To see park plans through to completion, a timeline and budget must be an essential part of the process, Harnik cautions. "The budget -- and even the potential opposition aroused by the budget -- is what often serves to motivate, unify and strengthen pro-park activists."

He cites Pittsburgh, where a $20 million plan to restore Schenley Park gathered dust because Mayor Sophie Masloff feared opposition from voters concerned about taxes and spending, especially in light of the city's financial problems. But when the next mayor, Tom Murphy, reopened the discussion, it sparked tremendous public activity that resulted not only in an improved park, but also the formation of private partnerships and advocacy groups to support the expansion of parks and trails in the city.

The worst economy since the Great Depression might not seem like a propitious time to build new parks. But Urban Green includes examples of successful projects costing tens of millions of dollars for which "there was no money" at the outset. Voter surveys show that people in both liberal and conservative areas are willing to pay higher taxes for parks and land conservation. In 2008, ballot measures for creating and restoring parks and preserving open space passed in Charlotte, Tampa, San Francisco, Seattle, Phoenix, Santa Fe and scores of other cities, towns and counties.

Park Politics

Harnik emphasizes the importance of politics in creating a great urban park system -- "politics based on the muscle of grassroots supporters, the brains of sophisticated leadership, and the nerves of elected politicians who know when to stand firm and when to compromise."

It is generally agreed that in Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who wrote the preface to this book, New York has a leader who understands the importance of parks and public space to the city's economic and environmental sustainability (and to the health and well-being of its citizens). He has made creating new open space and putting a park within 10 minutes of every resident a major goal of PlaNYC 2030.

However laudable, though, the plan emerged largely from the top down, without the goals and ideas for parks and public space emerging from neighborhoods and reflecting their residents' needs and desires. In creating the sustainability plan, the Bloomberg administration met with more than 150 organizations and solicited public input, but it did not undertake a true master planning process.

In an effort to help communities throughout the city fill this gap, the citywide parks advocacy group New Yorkers for Parks recently created its own Open Space Index, which sets flexible targets for different types of open space in neighborhoods based on extensive research and widely accepted best practices. The organization hopes that communities will use the index to determine and advocate for their own park and recreation goals, according to Cheryl Huber, deputy director of New Yorkers for Parks.

Using the index, New Yorkers for Parks conducted a pilot study on the Lower East Side to assess current open space and recreational options. The group then met with community stakeholders to present the results, get feedback, establish priorities and develop a strategy to gain the agreed upon improvements. With funds from Councilmember Julissa Ferreras, the organization will use the index to guide the creation of a parks agenda in Jackson Heights, Queens.

Ideas from All Over

Finding space for parks is one of the biggest challenges in built-out urban areas where the price of rare empty lots is high. The second half of Urban Green examines numerous possible solutions to this dilemma from cities around the country including New York. The ideas range from low-tech community gardens to complex engineering projects like decking over highways and reservoirs.

A great many of these ideas for squeezing in park access already are being put to the test in New York City as part of PlaNYC 2030 (and even before that), such as turning underused streets into public plazas, installing lighting to make playing fields usable at night, making the former Fresh Kills landfill into a park and opening schoolyards to the community.

Former industrial sites offer some of the best opportunities to create a significant amount of new parkland and revitalize city centers at the same time. "As seeds for regrowth, parks are key," Harnik writes. "But they must be reserved, designed and placed in advance of the built environment that will surround them," which, he notes, doesn't come naturally in this country -- or, one might add, in New York City. The city's development-driven culture has led to missed opportunities to create large areas of new parkland around which housing and commerce can grow.

One example is the Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn, where an arena and 16 apartment towers are being built partly on a deck covering the Metropolitan Transportation Authority railyards. The green space between the apartment buildings is slated to be added last, leading many to fear it will never exist. And even if the project and its parks are completed as planned, a neighborhood with a severe shortage of parks and sports fields will end up with a slightly lower ratio of parkland to resident than it now has.

Harnik's book inspires a momentary fantasy of what downtown Brooklyn might have looked like with a new central green space -- one that could have been funded with part of the nearly $300 million subsidy the city and state provided for the arena. A park might even have generated a greater economic return than the arena.

Updating the Sustainability Plan

On Earth Day this year, Bloomberg announced that his administration would begin updating PlaNYC and invited New Yorkers to send in their suggestions. Public meetings will be held in the fall, but are not yet scheduled, said Bloomberg spokesman Jason Post.

What's next for New York City? To preserve all of our remaining unprotected natural areas, such as Pouch Camp in the heart of the Staten Island Greenbelt? Create an aerial system of parks on the rooftops? Expand and make permanent a network of community gardens and farms and teach children to garden in schoolyards, to bring fresh and healthy food into low-income communities? Not very likely. But, then again, what were the odds of creating a stunning park on an old rail line that adjacent property owners wanted to tear down?

Reducing dependence on the automobile and reversing land-use patterns that consume forests and farms at an alarming rate will be essential in addressing global warming and meeting the other environmental challenges of the 21st century. Strengthening and creating compact urban cores is an important piece of the puzzle. Great park systems can help create the kind of cities people will want to live in. Urban Green shows that, when the political will is there, parks will follow. Who knows what seemingly impossible green spaces New Yorkers will be enjoying in 2030?

On Tuesday, July 27, the New York City Parks Department is presenting a talk by author Peter Harnik on Innovative Parks for Resurgent Cities. It will take place in the Arsenal in Central Park at 6 p.m.

Anne Schwartz, in charge of the parks topic page since its inception in 1999, is a journalist who specializes in environmental issues.

Pitting Parks Against Open Space


Hudson river park
A view from Hudson River Park, one of several city parks that received money from the state Environmental Protection Fund.

Singling out the state parks and environment for symbolic belt-tightening, Gov. David Paterson last month pressured the state legislature into accepting steep and disproportionate cuts to conservation funding in exchange for reopening 55 shuttered parks and historic sites in time for the Memorial Day weekend.

With the budget two months late and negotiations stalled, the governor chose an area representing less than one quarter of a percent of the total budget to launch his strategy of forcing cuts through temporary budget extender bills needed to keep the state operating.

In a move that has troubling implications for the future of the city and state's environment, legislators were cornered into choosing between two programs that have broad public support -- the state parks and the l Environmental Protection Fund, the state's main source of capital expenditures for open space and farmland preservation, parks and recreation, historic preservation, waterfront revitalization and recycling.

"There is no free lunch," Paterson said in a press release. "If legislators want to fully fund the parks, that money must come from a real source."

The closure of parks earlier in the spring for the first time in New York's history raised a huge outcry among constituents who are using state parks in greater numbers than ever (Memorial Day weekend visits were up 17 percent from last year) and from upstate towns that depend on park-related tourism revenue.

Funded by the Fund

The Environmental Protection Fund, which gets most of its revenue from the real estate transfer tax, also has tremendous constituent support, said Assemblymember Robert K. Sweeney of Suffolk County, who chairs the committee on environmental conservation.

New York City has received more than $200 million from the fund over the past decade and a half to help protect some of its last tracts of open space, build parks and trails such as Hudson River Park, the Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway, the Harlem River Greenway and the Bronx River greenway, and to restore Jamaica Bay's disappearing wetlands. The Environmental Protection Fund has preserved land upstate around the city's reservoirs as well as farms that supply locally grown produce.

Over the past several years, the state has raided the fund of $500 million of unspent money that was earmarked for pending projects. With this year's cut of 37 percent, the fund will have little money left for new efforts, including a proposed conservation easement on Pouch Camp in the heart of the Staten Island Greenbelt. The 143-acre Boy Scout camp may be sold for development unless the funds can be found to preserve it.

"Opening parks is great, but doing so at the expense of our other natural resources is a violation of the public's trust," said Marcia Bystryn, president of the New York League of Conservation Voters.

Out of Context

Determining these two parts of the budget in a vacuum has deprived the public and legislators of the opportunity to consider priorities in the context of the larger budget and to weigh spending on parks and the environment against the economic returns and savings. Parks and conservation are often considered a luxury -- a view Paterson apparently shares -- but, to the contrary, investing in the environment has been shown to bring significant economic benefits.

One recent analysis from New Jersey found that every dollar invested in a bond measure for conservation would return $10 in economic benefits such as farm and fish products, outdoor recreation and ecosystem services such as flood prevention.

Yet the state routinely allocates an amount almost equivalent to this year's entire Environmental Protection Fund appropriation to individual brick and mortar projects whose benefits flow primarily to a few large corporations or developers, such as $104 million for infrastructure for one private sports arena at Atlantic Yards and $63 million to subsidize parking garages for the benefit of the privately owned New York Yankees.

And, like so many decisions that led the state into the current budget mess, skimping on the environment trades savings now for much higher costs in the future. It is far less expensive to protect open space around watersheds, for example, than to build the costly infrastructure needed to treat water once it's contaminated.

By cutting appropriations for open space and farmland preservation, the state will also forfeit significant federal and local matching funds and miss out on the current buyer's market for land acquisition.

Hitting Conservation Hard

The final agreement on parks reached late in May sliced $78 million from last year's Environmental Protection Fund funding of $212 million. This leaves the fund with $134 million -- less than half of the $300 million per year it was supposed to reach by 2010 under the 2007 Environmental Protection Fund Enhancement Act.

Land conservation took the largest hit. Funds for open space were reduced from $58.9 million to $17.6 million, although legislators overturned the governor's moratorium on land acquisition and kept the program alive. The agreement cut farmland preservation from $22 million to $10.7 million.

One bright spot for parks was an increase, to $16 million from $5 million last year, for stewardship (such as restoring habitat, improving safety and rehabilitating infrastructure) and access to state parks and natural areas. This reflects Paterson's positionthat rather than acquiring new land the state should take care of what it already owns.

The legislation, however, pared funding for municipal parks by a third, largely by decreasing spending on inner city and underserved areas and reducing appropriations to the Hudson River Park from $6 million to $3 million. "The deal benefits state parks but is pretty injurious to the municipal parks program," said Robert Moore, executive director of Environmental Advocates, a private watchdog group.

Waterfront revitalization received half of the previous year's amount. Zoos, botanic gardens and aquariums, however, were spared, and remain at the same funding level as last year, $9 million.

Legislators claimed some victories, including preventing the use of actual Environmental Protection funds for parks operating expenses as well as for $5 million of Forest Preserve payments in lieu of taxes (PILOTs). Although it might seem logical to pay for these programs out of a fund for the environment, advocates say it would have set a dangerous precedent.

"I had a terrible vision that it would be $5 million this year, $10 million the next year, and pretty soon the entire EPF would be Forest Preserve PILOTs and agency management," said Assemblymember Sweeney.

The governor sweetened the deal for legislators who opposed cutting the fund by throwing in long-sought legislation mandating recycling of electronic equipment, with $4 million in new fees dedicated to the Environmental Protection Fund.

The Future of the EPF

The Environmental Protection Fund was created to provide a reliable source of funding, in good times and bad, to protect the state's environment and public health. Legislation establishing the fund noted that "the preservation, enhancement, restoration, improvement and stewardship of the state's environment are among the government's most fundamental obligations."

Although the Environmental Protection Fund is supposedly dedicated money for the environment, over the years the governor and legislature have treated it as a handy source of cash to plug budget holes, both through "sweeps" of unspent funds and reductions in annual appropriations.

"Money that was supposed to be waiting in the account was removed, so it creates a backlog. It's getting to the point where we are using current year appropriations for projects initiated in past years. We are starting to look backward instead of to the future," said Jessica Ottney, director of state government relations for The Nature Conservancy in New York.

"The ability of the Environmental Protection Fund to function properly requires a commitment on the part of both houses and the governor, and right now the governor part of the equation is missing," said Sweeney.

Even the fund's 2008 high-water mark of $250 million fell far short of what other, less populous states have dedicated to preserving open space and creating parks per capita. Last year, New Jersey voters approved a two-year $400 million conservation bond. In 2008, the citizens of Minnesota passed a three-eighths of a cent sales tax surcharge for land and water conservation, parks and the arts that is expected to raise $290 million this year.

The crushing budget deficit, the disarray of the state government, and this year's disproportionate cut to the Environmental Protection Fund do not bode well for New York state's parks, open space, farmland and water supplies.

Yet, as the enormous reaction to closing the parks demonstrated, the public cares deeply about parks, open space and protecting the environment. "All the polling that we've done in New York state shows that voters understand the benefits of these funds and are consistently willing to contribute through whatever funding mechanism the polls suggest toward public investment in open space and clean water protection," said Ottney. "We've seen those be consistent throughout this economic decline."

Anne Schwartz, in charge of the parks topic page since its inception in 1999, is a journalist who specializes in environmental issues.

Vendor Rules Promise Less Art, More Cupcakes in City Parks


street vendors
Mohammad Ali sells hot dogs Downtown.

Spring in New York means cherry blossoms in the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, the Yankees home opener and the return of vendors to city parks. But while the cherry trees are performing as usual and the Yankees returned to the Bronx to defeat the Angels yesterday, fewer vendors may peddle their wares in city parks this year.

New rules proposed by the Department of Parks and Recreation would limit the number of artists selling their goods in Manhattan's most popular parks. These restrictions on vending come as the city has begun auctioning park spots to food vendors and cracking down on cart and table owners who leave their goods unattended. The rules and penalties, which the city argues are needed to combat irksome and sometimes dangerous congestion, complicate the already difficult situation for thousands of men and women who sell everything from paintings to pretzels on New York's busy streets.

Art in the Parks

For decades, parks have provided a safe refuge for artists to sell their work. Stroll through Battery Park or Union Square on a weekend and you will likely see over a hundred artists displaying their work. But as the parks department proposes new rules to ease congestion, many artists will need to find a new spot or a new job.

Unlike vendors who sell hot dogs or handbags, those who vend "expressive matter," such as books, paintings and photographs, are protected by the First Amendment. This has allowed art vendors to display their goods inside city parks, while purveyors of more mundane goods, such as hot dogs, cannot.

The department has tried repeatedly to rid the parks of art vendors, but always lost in the courts. Its latest attempt would restrict the number of art vendors to 9 in Battery Park, 18 in Union Square, 5 on the High Line, and 49 in Central Park’s high-traffic areas. If the new regulations pass, the spots will be distributed on a first come, first serve basis, potentially pitting artist against artist.

The department will hold a hearing on the proposal on April 23.

"The three park locations that the proposed rules effects … have seen a dramatic increase in street vendors," Manhattan Parks Commissioner Bill Castro said. "This has caused the parks department to come up with new regulations to find a balance between vendors and visitors."

The rule changes could mean the end of a way of life for many artists. Two years ago, Samira Deroucha lost her job tutoring French. To pay her bills, she began selling her paintings in Union Square.

Deroucha, who emigrated from France in 2001, said the new rules would create more than just a financial loss. "Union Square is one of the only places where local artists can express themselves," she said. "The street artists market is on every single tourist guide, and it would be a loss to the city if they got rid of us."

street vendor
Jampa Jordan sells photos in Columbus Circle. While selling of food and clothing is restricted, photos and other "expressive matter" is protected by the First Amendment. The city, though, wants to put some limits on the art vendors, as well.

"If these rules pass we're going to defy them and sue the city," said Robert Lederman, the president of A.R.T.I.S.T., or Artists' Response To Illegal State Tactics, an advocacy group that represents about 1,500 street artists. Lederman and fellow art vendors will protest the rule changes before the parks department’s public hearing next week.

Castro said the law is on the city's side. The proposed rules, he said, don't "violate anyone's first amendment rights. Government has the right to place restrictions based on time, place, and manner."

Hold the Mustard

Many of the art vendors, though, suspect the limit is an attempt to privatize city parks and get vendors to bid on spots.

Recently, the department granted Cake & Shake a permit to sell gourmet cupcakes in front the Metropolitan Museum, an area that has been off limits to most food vendors. In return, Cake & Shake will pay $108,000 to the city. The cupcake vendor also will pay $27,000 for a spot in Washington Square Park.

For years, the city auctioned spots around the Metropolitan Museum of Art to food vendors. The permitting more or less fell apart, though, when military veterans set up shop, saying they could sell without leasing the spot from the city. Last summer, the city cracked down, forcing out most of the hot dog vendors.

Now the parks department wants vendors back -- but not just any vendors. After reportedly saying it was looking for "healthy options," the administration selected Cake & Shake, a Long Island based company that sells $3 cupcakes and $5 shakes.

Mean Streets

Castro said any vendors forced off the museum steps or out of the major Manhattan parks still will be allowed to "sell their goods in other city parks and the thousands of miles of city sidewalks." Hakim Elnagar might tell him that's not as easy as it might sound.

Standing on 42nd Street, two blocks west of Times Square, Elnagar watches as the flow of pedestrians quietly pass by his cart. In over half an hour only one person stops to ask for a pretzel.

Elnagar left Egypt 13 years ago to find a better life for his family. As he has tried to build his business, he has found that the life of a street vendor is not easy. He and his fellow vendors must contend with rival pushcarts and local businesses, with tickets and police, and with a system of licensing that has created a black market of illegal permits.

On Friday, Elnagar will appear in court to contest a ticket he received for vending in a bus stop. Elnagar said he will argue that the bus in question is a private tour bus that parked illegally and that his cart remains more than 100 feet away from a city bus stop.

The stakes for Elnagar are high. The maximum penalty for such violations reaches $1,000, a lot of money for the average street vendor, who typically brings in about $14,000 to $17,000 a year. In the past year alone, Elnagar received 17 tickets, most, he says, he did not deserve.

"The biggest problem that vendors have is tickets," said Sean Basinski, the director of the Urban Justice Center's Street Vendor Project, an advocacy group that provides legal representation for street vendors. Shuffling through a large pile of tickets, which has been growing over the past two months, Basinski picks out a few he views as particularly ridiculous: a shish kabob seller who left his cart window open, a fruit vender with a moldy blueberry, and vendor whose cooler stuck out from under his table. Police officers fine these slight infractions, Basinski says, because street vendors are "easy targets."

"The vendor probably won't speak English, probably won't complain, probably won't file a complaint and probably won't even be able to read what the ticket is for," he said.

To combat the ticketing, the Street Vendor Project provides measuring tape and cameras while encouraging its member to take down the names and badge numbers of police officers. Basinski admits that this is sometimes easier said then done. Some police officers roll up their windows and write tickets from inside their patrol car without giving vendors a chance to get names or ask questions.

Elnagar has contested tickets before and knows how the process works. He is confident the charges will be dropped, but even if he wins, Elnagar will still take a loss. "The captain says, 'I'm sorry for the wrong violation,' but what does sorry do for me?" he asked. "You take a day away from me, and the 50, 60, 70 dollars I make for my kids."

"We work hard, we want a good life," he said. "We try, we try, but we get nothing,"

To further complicate the picture, in January, the health department began to enforce its policy of removing the license sof vendors who leaves their carts unattended. Under the new policy, "Any mobile food vending unit which is found to be unattended or which a vendor has abandoned shall be considered an imminent health hazard."

The policy has come under criticism for leaving vendors unable to answer when nature calls. On Feb. 23, street vendors protested outside the health department's offices after peanut vender Mohammed Shirajul Islam lost his license for taking too long a bathroom break.

According to the health department, "The department’s rules do not prevent vendors from taking short breaks, but leaving food unsupervised poses a serious health hazard as it subjects the food to possible tampering." Critics, though, claim that anyone who wants to tamper with food does not need to wait for a vendor to relieve himself, but only to walk to the salad bar at the local grocery store.

Crowding the Streets

While the vendors see themselves as small businesspeople struggling to make a living and provide a service, many brick and mortar businesses have a different view of street selling. "It's a huge problem for our commercial and retail businesses," said Joseph Timpone, the director of operations for the Downtown Alliance. "It’s a problem for pedestrians trying to get around."

"We have areas where there is no vending allowed at all, and every day we have people setting up in the World Trade Center, a problem for the thousands who take the PATH," he said.

Unlicensed vendors and those who ignore vending laws cause dangerous "traffic conditions," according to the Manhattan district attorney's office. On Canal Street, pedestrians often must step into the road to avoid sidewalks clogged by handbag, t-shirt, and luggage vendors.

In 2009, the First Precinct, covering much of downtown Manhattan, arrested 810 unlicensed vendors. The Midtown North and Midtown South Precincts arrested 284, and 416 unlicensed vendors, respectively.

Black Market

In 1979, the city placed a cap on the number of licenses available, about 3,000 for food vendors and 853 for general merchandise. In 2008, Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s initiative to get healthy food into poor neighborhoods resulted in the approval of 1,000 new "green carts" for fruit and vegetable vendors.

There is a loophole, though. The cap has not applied to veterans since World War II veteran Joseph Kaswan cited a Civil War era law to challenge a ban on street vendors in midtown.

Even with that exemption, the competition for licenses remains strong. At one point the city established a waiting list for individuals wanting to obtain a vending license. So many applied, though, that the city has not accepted any new names 2002.

With the market largely frozen, vendors who retire or move on to other occupations, continue to renew their licenses every two years for a $200 fee, and then rent them out for upward of $12,000. By some estimates, nearly two thirds of the food licenses are obtained in this way.

The health department has taken steps to combat the practice, but some feel their efforts have not gone far enough. To encourage people to report the illicit sales, the Street Vendors Project has proposed that vendors who report illegal license brokers receive a chance to obtain their licenses legally, and become sidewalk entrepreneurs.

Then, though, they would be on their own.



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