East River Park Reopening, in Parts, South of Williamsburg Bridge

Things are happening on the Lower East Side waterfront, and with the Memorial Day Weekend kickoff to summer just around the corner, it’s time to review some of them.

But first, make sure to grab a hat, and, unless it’s raining, put on some sunscreen too, because where we’re going—East River Park—there’s very little shade. Why?

Because the powers that be bulldozed nearly all the trees!

This is the legacy of many people—including former Mayor Bill de Blasio and outgoing, term-limited local Council Member Carlina Rivera—as well as a late-October 2012 hurricane named Sandy, but, without refighting past bitterly contested battles, there’s no way of getting around the reality that somewhere around 1,000 trees have thus far been destroyed in the name of the East Coast Resiliency Project (ECRP).

That’s the bad news.

The good news is that on Memorial Day, Monday, May 26, a significant portion of East River Park south of the Williamsburg Bridge will reopen after more than three years of construction.

Because the park areas north of the bridge remain closed to Houston Street, the only way to access the newly opened park will be via the Delancey Street Bridge, which opened in September 2024.

As this reporter noted at the time, “as a bridge, it gets the job done”—which means getting one from the south side of Delancey Street and Baruch Place up and over the FDR Drive and onto a long paved path to what’s officially known as Ballfields 1 and 2: a combination soccer and baseball / softball fields—all artificial turf, of course. With no water fountains, only two portable toilets, and the general feel of a construction zone, this section of the park was clearly a work in progress.

The area opening on Memorial Day should increase this area’s attractiveness and utility quite a bit; to make it, in other words, a park that feels like a park. While the finishing touches are still being made, visitors will now have access to a nature-exploration area, just inland from the historic Fireboat House (previously home to the Lower East Side Ecology Center); basketball courts; an open natural-grass lawn; a barbecue area; tennis courts, and a new multi-use field—again artificial turf.

As public amenities, all these things merit praise. Further, both renderings from the city’s Department of Design and Construction (DDC), and this reporter’s recent visits to the site suggest that a cautious optimism is warranted.

One thing that stands out as a concern, however—besides the glaring lack of mature trees or shade throughout the area—is the proximity of the basketball courts to the northbound FDR Drive with nothing between them at present but an access road for construction vehicles.

While parks next to highways are not unknown, it would seem to this parks reporter that a berm of some kind could have been added to further separate the courts from the highway, akin to how Brooklyn Bridge Park uses berms to insulate park users from both Furman Street on the ground, and the elevated BQE above.

In any event, come Memorial Day, Straus News will be on the scene with an in-depth, on-the-basketball-courts report on how this all works out in practice.

Meanwhile, down at Corlears Hook, there’s a new bridge in town!

It’s called, appropriately enough, the Corlears Hook Bridge, and in fact, the span was installed last autumn, over the weekend of October 19-20.

Other than DDC hailing the event—and the use of Accelerated Bridge Construction to minimize traffic disruption—on its X account, the installation received little notice.

The reasons for this are manifold, starting with the relative isolation of Corlears Hook. If one doesn’t live nearby, as the NYCHA Vladeck House residents and others do, or utilize the NYC Ferry stop there, it’s easy to overlook. Sadly, the most attention Corlears Hook Park has gotten in recent years is the horrific car crash there by an alleged drunk driver that killed four people and injured numerous others last July 4.

Nonetheless, the bridge is there, and though landscaping in the park is proceeding at a decent clip—it’s not quite open yet. DDC is currently looking at a mid-to-late-August opening. This will be welcomed by all deep Lower East Side residents wishing to access East River Park, not least the indefatigable non-profit volunteer group Friends of Corlears Hook Park.

Check out their homepage, or Facebook and Instagram accounts, to keep up on the various free public events the group offers, including T’ai Chi, karate, gardening, volleyball, gardening, and more.