NYC Parks Department hates mowing the lawn just as much as everyone else

June 12, 2018 By Gordon Walker Special to the Brooklyn Daily Eagle

This is 33 Eagle St., which is part of the Greenpoint Landing mega-development, as seen in 2016. Eagle file photo by Lore Croghan

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The city Parks Department decided it won’t bother mowing the lawn in the new Greenpoint Landing park.

The developer Greenpoint Landing Associates is now backtracking as it doesn’t want to be forced to maintain its own lawn. They are set to build a 20,000-square-foot waterfront park between West, Eagle, and Huron streets and the East River.

The developer has asked the city to waive requirements that their park have grass or lots of plants because of a “Parks maintenance constraint.”

The Parks Department’s constraint is that they believe “small patches of lawn in parks do not hold up well over time,” so they find it would be easier to just do without the lawn at all.

Brooklyn Community Board 1’s parks and waterfronts committee had a meeting in May where the company officials shared this information, according to the New York Post.

“The private developer is paying them to take care of it. It’s not like it’s a money issue they just don’t want to take care of it,” said Victoria Cambranes, an open-space advocate present at the meeting.

Half of the proposed park plan is supposed to be plants, and a lawn is to constitute half of the planted space, according to the Waterfront Access Plan, which was implemented in 2005 in the rezoning of Greenpoint/Williamsburg.

“If they’re gonna pass rezoning that brings in tens of thousands of people to one area, then they must include the proper resources,” added Steve Chesler, a member of the committee who said he was only speaking as a concerned resident.