BROOKLYN — Brooklyn Greenway Initiative (BGI) will hold its 5th Annual Future Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway Bike Tour on Saturday, May 5 beginning at 9:30 a.m. This annual tour is a 10-mile ride from Greenpoint to Red Hook, highlighting the latest progress in the development of the greenway.
BGI is particularly excited this year to announce the release of “A User’s Guide to the Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway” at the tour kickoff in Greenpoint. The guide is a foldout map that depicts all 14 miles of preliminary and proposed Greenway routes along the Brooklyn waterfront, and includes waterfront views, refreshment areas, connecting modes of transportation, and the many current and future parks and public spaces that will be linked by the greenway.
The guide, developed by BGI and the Regional Plan Association (RPA) and the New York Community Trust, took over eight months to produce. According to Meg Fellerath, BGI’s director of programs, “The development process took a little longer than we expected, but the extra time was well worth it. Previews of the map have gotten rave reviews from all quarters.” All participants in the May 5 bike tour will receive a free copy of the map.
“We’re also very proud to have Brooklyn Historical Society (BHS) on board as a tour co-sponsor this year, and it couldn’t be a better tie-in to the project,” says BGI co-founder Brian McCormick. Although the tour will not focus on Brooklyn’s waterfront history per se, BHS waterfront neighborhood guides will be available that day.
“Brooklyn’s waterfront is going through unprecedented changes, not seen since perhaps the transition from farms and tidal mills to industry in the first half of the 19th century. If riders can get a sense of that during this tour, it will inform the debate on what will come, including how the greenway will be experienced,” he adds.
In 2004, Borough President Marty Markowitz sponsored a New York State Environmental Protection Fund planning grant that allowed BGI and RPA to produce the Conceptual Plan for the Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway in Community Boards 2 and 6, completed in 2005. In that same year, the project received $14.6 million in federal funding.
In 2006, BGI and RPA received a second round of state funding to take the project into design and engineering in Community Boards 2 and 6 and to produce a Conceptual Plan for the Greenway in Community Board 1 (Greenpoint/Williamsburg). As part of this process, BGI will hold a public planning workshop on May 24 in Williamsburg.
“This year’s bike tour, timed so closely with the workshop, will allow people to physically experience the route, get a basic grasp of the design issues, and then participate in the planning process all within the same month,” says Fellerath.
In addition, the assembling of property for the greenway right of way is approaching completion. “It involves property from six public agencies and dozens of private property owners,” said Milton Puryear, BGI’s co-founder and director of planning. “In some places, the property lines run down the middle of the future greenway. For example, at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, NYC DOT has agreed to extend sidewalks and the Navy Yard Development Corporation has agreed to fence setbacks that will convert 10 to 13-foot sidewalks into a new 30-foot greenway right of way.”
To register for the May 5 bike tour, send your name and full contact information to ride2007@brooklyngreenway.org. The tour starts at 10 a.m. sharp. The tour is free but donations are welcome.
© Brooklyn Daily Eagle 2007
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