The Accidental Playground: Brooklyn Waterfront Narratives of the Undesigned and Unplanned

Notes

NOTES Prologue 1. New York State, Office of the Governor, Press Release (June 13, 2000). 2. The oil spill, which accumulated over many decades from refining and storage facilities located along the Newtown Creek, contaminated more than fifty-two acres of Greenpoint and has greatly contributed to the contamination of the creek. See U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, “Newtown Creek/Greenpoint Oil Spill Study Brooklyn, New York” (2007). 3. NYC Department of City Planning, Williamsburg Waterfront 197-a Plan (approved by the City Planning Commission, December 2001; adopted by the City Council and published, 2002), p. 50. 4. The Parks Council (of New York City), Creating Public Access to the New York Waterfront (1990); Hunter College Graduate Urban Planning Studio, Bridges: Greenpoint–Williamsburg Waterfront Plan (1995); NYC Department of City Planning, Williamsburg Waterfront 197-a Plan (2001). See also Trust for Public Land, New Parkland for New Yorkers (1995). 5. A more formal opening and ribbon-cutting ceremony was held at the park on July 3, 2007. 6. NYC Department of City Planning, Williamsburg Waterfront 197-a Plan (2001). 7. See John Logan and Harvey Moltoch, Urban Fortunes: The Political Economy of Place (Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University ofCaliforniaPress,1987);SusanFainstein,TheCityBuilders:PropertyDevelopmentinNewYorkandLondon,1980–2000(2nded.)(Lawrence :UniversityPressofKansas,2001);LauraWolf-Powers,“Up-ZoningNewYorkCity’sMixedUseNeighborhoods:Property-Led Economic Development and the Anatomy of a Planning Dilemma,” Jnl. of Planning Education and Research 24–4 (2005), pp. 379–93. 8. See Paul Davidoff, “Advocacy and Pluralism in Planning,” Jnl.oftheAmericanInstituteofPlanners 31 (November 1965), pp. 331–38; Tom Angotti, New York for Sale: Community Planning Confronts Global Real Estate (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2008). 1. Discovering and Engaging a Vacated Waterfront 1. Daniel Campo, “Brooklyn’s Vernacular Waterfront,” Jnl. of Urban Design 7–2 (2002); Daniel Campo, On the Waterfront: Vernacular Recreation at Brooklyn Eastern District Terminal (University of Pennsylvania dissertation, 2004). 266 notes to pages 14–28 2. This definition of the vernacular is adapted from James Brinkerhoff Jackson’s Discovering the Vernacular Landscape (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1985). 3. John Callahan, “Diesel Replaces Last Iron Horse,” N.Y. Times (October 26, 1963), p. 54; Jay Bendersky, Brooklyn’s Waterfront Railways (Mineola, N.Y.: Weekend Chief Publishing, 1988); Flagg, New York Harbor Railroads. 4. Edward Burks, “Rail-Car Floating: A Chancy Business,” N.Y. Times (November 9, 1976); Flagg, New York Harbor Railroads, p. 10. 5. Thomas Flagg, New York Harbor Railroads in Color, Volume I (Kutztown, Pa.: Morning Sun Books, 2000). 6. Alfred Eichner, The Emergence of the Oligopoly: Sugar Refining as a Case-Study (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1966). 7. “New Flour Center Built in Brooklyn,” N.Y. Times (March 24, 1964); Bendersky, Brooklyn’s Waterfront Railways; Flagg, New York Harbr Railroads; BEDT web site maintined by Philip Goldstein (accessed March 2013). 8. See BEDT web site maintained by Philip Goldstein (http://members.trainweb.com/bedt/BEDT.html) (accessed March 2013). 9. NYC Department of City Planning, New York City Comprehensive Waterfront Plan: Reclaiming the Edge (1992). 10. Campo, “Brooklyn’s Vernacular Waterfront.” 11. An esplanade typically places people well above and separated from the water’s edge by a low fence. The Battery Park City Esplanade along the Hudson River in lower Manhattan, developed during the 1980s and 1990s, exemplifies the approach and has served as a model for subsequent waterfront projects in the city. The south side of the redeveloped BEDT site—between North 4th and North 7th streets—features a similarly designed esplanade, though one executed with different materials. 12. Campo, “Brooklyn’s Vernacular Waterfront.” 13. Richard Perez-Pena, “Reeling in Many a Meal on the East River, and Maybe a Risky Mess of PCBs,” N.Y.Times (June 29, 2003). New York State Department of Health guidelines suggest that blue crabs caught in the East River be consumed only at the maximum rate of six per a week for men. For women under fifty and children under fifteen, guidelines recommend avoiding these crabs entirely. New York State Department of Health web site, “New York City Region Fish Advisories” (http://www.health.ny.gov/ environmental/outdoors/fish) (accessed July 2012). 14. Galen Cranz, The Politics of Park Design: A History of Urban Parks in America (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1982). 15. Michel Foucault, “Of Other Spaces,” Diacritics 14–1 (1986), pp. 22–27. 16. Village Voice, Best of New York (2000), http://www.villagevoice.com/bestof/2000/award/best-vacant-lot-493785 (accessed December 2011). 17. My very abbreviated list of critiques of...