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Planning a River's Renaissance

By JAMES FERGUSSON

For decades, community leaders and environmentalists have dreamed of cleaning up the Harlem River, and renovating its underutilized eastern shoreline. It’s quite a dream.

The eight-mile waterway is polluted; its shoreline, on which factories and power plants once stood, is presumed to be one large brownfield (land whose redevelopment is complicated by environmental hazards).

But in recent years there have been pockets of progress along the water’s edge. River Plaza Shopping Center, with its Target and Starbucks, opened on a former industrial site in Marble Hill in 2004. In Morris Heights, Roberto Clemente State Park is on the cusp of a $20 million rehab.

And then there’s the work being done by the Bronx Council for Environmental Quality (BCEQ), and partners, who are looking at the possibility of renovating 162 acres of brownfield land between the river and the Major Deegan Expressway.

Earlier this year, BCEQ submitted a lengthy description of the area to their backers – the State’s Brownfield Opportunity Area (BOA) Program. Now, the BOA Program says they’ll fund a further study which will investigate the exact condition of the land and the feasibility of reclaiming it for public and private use.

Ultimately, the BOA Program aims to provide expertise, help attract investors, and build community consensus over what to, and how to develop, particular sites.

Hilary Kitasei, the Harlem River BOA’s project manager, says they’ve “yet to receive a dime” from the BOA Program. Still, the project is slowly moving forward, she says, as they build on “three generations worth of planning.”

BCEQ, with input from the community and various community groups, would like to see waterfront parks and an accessible shoreline so local residents and tourists can enjoy boating, fishing, and even swimming. This fits in nicely with the Parks Department’s hopes for a Harlem River Greenway, a continuous sliver of green along the river’s edge. “Our hope is this [BCEQ’s studies] helps them carry out the Greenway plan,” said Kitasei.

To some extent, these visions have been taken from the past. For in the late 19th century, the Harlem River was a hive of activity, a waterway teeming with yachts and sculls.

The river would have been thick with life – bass, oysters, and clams. In the 1890s, a man by the name of John Burns ran “Cedar Jack’s Last Stand Clam Bar,” on a site close to Yankee Stadium, according to Lloyd Ultan, the Bronx borough historian. It sounds like City Island. (“Try and find a fish now!” said Ultan.)

Meanwhile, beautiful parks lined the shorelines and cliff tops on both sides of the river. Tourists and local residents alike would stroll across the pedestrian only High Bridge, the city oldest bridge, to take in the magnificent views.

When industry arrived, and the borough’s population swelled, this picture postcard scenery began to fade. Access to the waterfront from upland neighborhoods was becoming more difficult, too. Already, local residents had to negotiate steep cliffs and the railroad (today run by Metro North). From 1956 onwards, they faced another barrier in the newly built Deegan.

The cliffs, highway, and rail companies, continue to present problems. So does landownership: over 50 percent of the total acreage is owned by the rail companies. How willing these railroads are to give up their yards and maintenance facilities, could affect what redevelopment is possible. Moreover, said Kitasei, waterfront access is all well and good, but if the water’s filthy, no one will go near, let alone take a dip.

Stopping sewage from entering the waterway is thus vital. (The city’s sewer system is old and inadequate and overflows with every heavy storm, pouring some 27 billion gallons a year of mixed sewage and storm water into city waterways. Organizations such as S.W.I.M (Storm Water Infrastructure Matters), hope to change this by capturing rain water on rooftops and sidewalk gardens.)

Overall, Kitasei remains hopeful. “You can’t look at this river and not be moved by its potential,” she said.

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