Recap: DCP Shows CB6 Committee Some Waterfront Proposals

The Department of City Planning (DCP) came to Community Board 6’s Economic/Waterfront/et al. meeting on May 20 to talk about the future of the Gowanus Canal waterfront.

DCP has already talked about what they call a Shore Public Walkway, which is part of their rezoning plan for the area. They have issued pretty pictures of people walking in the 40 foot band that is reserved for parkland around the canal. The already existing Sponge Park, near the completed Lightstone Project, the first Gowanus Canal residential building, is an example.

During the Q&A portion, member Mark Shames said community members would like to see more life along the waterfront and beyond, programming-wise (aside from proposed dog runs, play areas and art areas, for example), to which DCP reminded the audience that 40 feet isn’t a huge amount of space.

“The amount and types of programming is limited,” they continued. “There are a few opportunities that maybe could have a gathering space for like a food market or evening cinemas – those are things that could occur.”

The Gowanus Dredgers Canoe Club’s treasurer, Owen Foote, complained againt that DCP isn’t requiring private developers to provide ladders that go to/from the water in their Waterfront Access Plan, and asked DCP and the CB6 committee to consider required access at the public portions that meet with the canal. The agency responded that those determinations wouldn’t happen until after the rezoning’s approved.

“We are just cautious about placing a requirement of access at certain street ends where we don’t know it it’s feasible,” DCP added. “We see the value of waterfront access and getting access to boat and kayak launches, for example, but those have to be evaluated case-by-case, by location. Those are things we don’t know yet.”

When resident Brad Vogel also asked if the plan would designate spots along the canal for working vessels to be tied up and offload cargo (to interface with the Mayor’s Freight NYC plan – a citywide effort that launched in July 2018 to move more freight by waterborne vessels instead of by trucks), the agency said that would be looked at on a case-by-case basis.

Photos from NYC Planning’s EWCDH Waterfront Access presentation on 5/20/19