NYC

NYC Creates the Model Waterfront Plan

NYC

Mayor Mike Bloomberg and the New York City council announced a new 10-year plan and set of ambitious projects that will dramatically remake New York City’s 520 miles of shoreline. The city says the new approach, the first major city plan focused on the watefront in two decades and the first ever for waterways, will provide a “sustainable framework” that will improve improve access to the waterfront, create new recreational spaces and natural habitats, increase the use of water-based transportation, and offer new opportunities for redevelopment and economic growth.

Along with the plan, there’s a new “action agenda” created with the Economic Development Corporation targeting 130 projects for funding and completion over the next three years. Among the major projects are more than 50 acres of new waterfront parks, 14 new waterfront esplanades, and a new commuter ferry service. These projects are expected to create 13,000 construction jobs and at least 3,400 permanent maritime and industrial jobs.

Mayor Bloomberg said: “New York City’s waterfront has always played a major role in its history and is one of its greatest assets – we have more miles of waterfront Chicago, Seattle, San Francisco, and Portland combined – but for decades New Yorkers have been blocked from it and it’s become less and less a part of their lives. We’re committed to making it a part of New Yorkers’ lives again by completely revitalizing the waterfront and waterways.” Amanda Burden, the dynamic head of NYC planning and chair of NYC’s planning commission, added that “our water is the connective tissue between our boroughs and is, in effect, our Sixth Borough. We are now planning for our waterfront and waterways with the same intensity and passion that we have traditionally planned for our land.” She added: “We can [...] use our Blue Network of waterways for transportation, recreation and education, for improving water quality, and for the first time addressing the challenges of global warming and sea-level rise.”

A few interesting components:

• Water-based approaches for increasing the city’s resilience to climate change. Specifically, this program will involve improving the city’s abilty to recover from coastal storm surges and flooding. The city will work with FEMA to update the “Flood Insurance Rate Maps to reflect current risks” and also invest in mapping out new flood escape routes.
• Investments in recreational boating on the water and new shore-based docks and public boat houses spread throughout the boroughs.
• The implementation of “NYHarborWay,” which will “connect eight major waterfront points of interest by ferry or bike greenways.” The sites include Brooklyn Bridge Park, Governors Island, Hudson River Park, The Battery, Ellis Island, Statue Liberty Island, the East River Esplanade and Liberty State Park.
• A new East River ferry service that will run between Brooklyn, Queens and Manhattan, providing a “convenient, sustainable transit option for developing communities and helping close the gap between our boroughs.” Also, there will be better connections with subways through an integrated MetroCard system.
• A new “New York City Water Trail” that will enable park users to canoe or kayak to and from more than 40 locations. 
• A sustainable ports plan that will explore moving “express-air cargo by water, potentially with airport passenger ferry service.” There will also be new “maritime hubs.”
• Some $50 million of investment in waterfront ecological restoration, including new wetlands and marshlands at key watefront parks, and an exploration of “opportunities for large-scale oyster restoration.” Also intriguing: a “wetlands mitigation bank.”

Another big plus: the plan is expected to help push forward NYC’s bold green infrastructure plans. While there are some $1.6 billion in water treatment plan upgrades (including $650 million in new grey infrastructure), the green infrastructure plans the city already approved in 2010 will lead to $1.5 billion added for natural approaches to stormwater management over 20 years. Perhaps this is not enough, but the waterfront plan does call for revamped regulations that can ”streamline design and permitting processes for the incorporation” of private sector-led green infrastructure projects. 

Burden said Vision 2020 was the result of a ”year-long, participatory planning process involving multiple agencies and organizations and input from New Yorkers in every borough.” Hundreds of public comments submitted online were used to create what seems to be another model big-city plan from this city’s management team and a very suitable companion for the ground-breaking PlaNYC.

Gloucester county times

The Gloucester County Times (GCT) is a daily newspaper in Woodbury, New Jersey, United States. Its main competitors are The Philadelphia Inquirer across the Delaware River in Pennsylvania, and the Courier-Post in South Jersey.
Christina Paciolla gives today’s top stories in the Gloucester County Times. 911 notes is a roundup of news and notes by Times police reporter Lucas Murray about police, fire and emergency medical services people in Gloucester County. Have something newsworthy that doesn’t make the crime blotter?
It is a sister newspaper to both the The News of Cumberland County (in Cumberland County) and Today’s Sunbeam (in Salem County), as all are owned by Advance Publications.
I saw an eagle flying over my house in Woodbury a few days ago.

Twenty-five years ago this would have been a remarkable sighting. In 1983, there was only one active bald eagle nest in New Jersey.

But things are different today. In fact, I suspect that if I spent a lot of time looking up into the sky on clear days, and scanning with binoculars the tops of tall trees and structures, I could probably see an eagle at least once a week without going far from home.

In 2009, there were 84 eagle nests in New Jersey, and 99 young birds fledged. Forty percent of the nests were along Delaware Bay and tributary rivers from Gloucester to Cape May Counties. A survey in January 2009 counted 282 eagles in New Jersey.

What happened? Why the change?

Probably the biggest factor was the banning of DDT and other allied pesticides in 1972. These chemicals induced production of very thin-shelled eggs that could not be successfully incubated.

In addition, the state of New Jersey, from 1983 to 1991, reared 60 eagle chicks, mostly from Canada, on artificial nesting platforms so that the birds, when mature, would return here to nest. Similar programs took place in other states.

In New Jersey, eagles typically lay two eggs between mid-February and early March. The incubation period is about 35 days. The young birds won’t leave the nest until May or early June, but they will hang around the nest tree for a while after that.

Juvenile eagles wander widely for their first four or five years, but established pairs tend to stay close to home.

In winter, our local populations are augmented by birds that have migrated in from points farther north, so there are more eagles in New Jersey in winter than in summer.

Where can you see an eagle? Well, you could drive around in suitable habitat, looking for big birds and very large nests in trees.

Or, just keep looking up (not while driving, please.)

An adult eagle, with white head and tail, is easy to recognize. Immatures, up to the age of three or so, are more or less uniformly dark, and could be mistaken for a turkey vulture.

But vultures have wings that are dark on the leading edge and pale on the trailing edge when viewed from below, and they soar with the wing tips above the body, making a shallow vee.

Eagles soar on flat wings.

Since bald eagles eat a lot of fish, you are most likely to see one near water. The marshes along Raccoon Creek and Oldman’s Creek are likely places in Gloucester County. Farther south, success is even more likely along or the Mannington Marshes in Salem County, or the marshes around Fortescue in Cumberland County.