By Mary Frost
Brooklyn Daily Eagle

DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN — Bids will go out this summer for a $4.5 million facelift for Walt Whitman Park, the long-neglected 2.9-acre area south of the OEM Building at Cadman Plaza East, Red Cross Place and Adams Street.

For several years, a large section of the park had been blacktopped for use as a parking lot for court personnel during the construction of the new Federal Courthouse at Tillary and Adams Streets.

Now that the garage under the courthouse is finished, the federal General Services Administration has “kept its promise,� as Dennis Holt reported in the Brooklyn Eagle earlier this month, to provide some funds towards the park’s reconstruction. Federal funds are also allocated, according to the city’s Executive Budget Register.

The Department of Parks’ preliminary design (see schematic on page 2) calls for a planted median at the Cadman Plaza East entrance, a green, mound-shaped oval in the middle of the park surrounding a “great lawn,� and a fountain that will double as a sprinkler for children.

Four Walt Whitman poems will be engraved in granite on the sides of the fountain. Additional trees will be planted throughout the park, including a grove of trees at the south end next to the courthouse.

Integration of Two Parks

One goal is to encourage non-active recreation, to keep the park from turning into a “dustbowl.� Another is to integrate Walt Whitman Park with next-door Cadman Plaza Park and the War Memorial, as envisioned when Phase 1 of the renovation of Cadman Plaza Park was designed. However, there is no Parks funding for Cadman Plaza Park north of the War Memorial nor of the memorial itself.

The schematic shows a security fence and bollards along Cadman Plaza East, replacing the unattractive cement barriers (also known as Jersey barriers) currently in place.

The New York City Department of City Planning’s original proposal called for the de-mapping Cadman Plaza East for use as a landscaped bike and pedestrian mall that would afford a through route from the DUMBO area (between the Brooklyn and Manhattan Bridges) to Borough Hall.

An early rendering shows benches, widened sidewalks with plantings, and antique street lamps lining Cadman Plaza East. However, the street is presently used as a judicial and OEM parking lot — and security blockades including “ballistic bunkers� are planned for either end.

A call to the Department of Transportation was not returned by publication deadline. CAP: Bids will go out this summer for a $4.5 million facelift for Walt Whitman Park, the long-neglected 2.9-acre rectangle south of the OEM Building at Cadman Plaza East. One goal is to encourage non-active recreation, to keep the park from turning into a “dust bowl.� Another is to integrate Walt Whitman Park with Cadman Plaza Park and the War Memorial. Photo courtesy of the NYC Design Commission

© Brooklyn Daily Eagle 2009 All materials posted on BrooklynEagle.com are protected by United States copyright law. Just a reminder, though -- It’s not considered polite to paste the entire story on your blog. Most blogs post a summary or the first paragraph,( 40 words) then post a link to the rest of the story. That helps increase click-throughs for everyone, and minimizes copyright issues. So please keep posting, but not the entire article. arturc at att.net