City officials celebrate the opening of two new ballfields at East River Park as part of the East Side Coastal Resiliency Project. Image Credit: NYC DDC.
On September 10, 2024, Mayor Eric Adams and other city officials celebrated the openings of two new ballfields in East River Park and the ADA-accessible Delancey Street Bridge, part of the ongoing East Side Coastal Resiliency Project. The project, which began in 2021, is the City’s $1.45 billion effort to create a 2.4-mile-long flood barrier on the Lower East Side, responding to climate change and more severe coastal storms.
The new ballfields feature turf with an advanced drainage system, new stadium lighting to allow for evening play, and new fencing. New amenities including tennis courts, multi-use turf fields, picnic and barbeque areas, playground, comfort stations, and basketball courts will also be added to East River Park. The Delancey Street Bridge spans the FDR Drive and replaced a previously smaller bridge with steeper ramps.
Much of the southern part of East River Park was closed in late 2021 to begin the resiliency project. To ensure the public does not have to go without these green and recreational spaces longer than necessary, the City has been reopening sections of the project that have been completed as the project goes on. The first floodgate for the project was installed in February 2022. Raised parkland, floodwalls, and 18 swinging or sliding floodgates are part of the project. The project will make improvements to five recreation areas. Stuyvesant Cove Park was rebuilt with new amenities. The Asser Levy Playground was partially rebuilt with new landscaping, playground, and basketball courts and features a sliding floodgate. In the future, Murphy Brothers Playground and Corlears Hook Park will also get new landscaping, lighting, playground equipment, and plantings. The Corlears Hook and East 10th Street Bridges will also be replaced with gently sloping entryways. Murphy Brothers Playground is expected to reopen this fall. The total resiliency project is expected to be completed in late 2026.
Mayor Adams stated, “Keeping New Yorkers safe means building state-of-the-art projects to protect New Yorkers from climate change, while at the same time ensuring that New Yorkers have high-quality spaces to play ball. That’s exactly what we’re doing here. We’re walking and chewing gum at the same time — fortifying our defenses and protecting our residents and city against sea level rise; safeguarding taxpayer dollars; and ensuring that we also get greener, cleaner, better public spaces in the process.”
Department of Design and Construction Commissioner Thomas Foley stated, “ESCR is not just about protecting 128,000 Lower East Side residents from flooding, it’s also increasing accessibility and making improvements to five important local recreation areas. We’re happy to live up to our commitment to reopen this part of East River Park by the start of September little league season, and we remain on budget and on schedule to complete the entire project by the end of 2026.”
By: Veronica Rose (Veronica is the Editor of CityLand and a New York Law School graduate, Class of 2018.)