- Generic Environmental Impact Statement (GEIS) Update
On May 16th, 2008, the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation issued the Notice of Completion for the Fresh Kills Park Draft Generic Environmental Impact Statement (DGEIS). Pursuant to state and local law, the DGEIS identifies any potential adverse environmental effects of proposed actions, assesses their significance, and proposes measures to eliminate or mitigate significant impacts.
The chapters of the DGEIS are available for download as individual PDF documents from the Department of Parks & Recreation website. Hard copies are also available at all Staten Island libraries and Community Boards.
A public hearing will be held on Thursday, September 4th at 7 p.m. at PS 58, located at 77 Marsh Avenue in Staten Island.
Written comments on the DGEIS may be submitted to: Joshua Laird, Assistant Commissioner for Planning and Natural Resources, New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, The Arsenal, Central Park, 830 5th Avenue, Room 403, New York, NY 10065.
- Fresh Kills Tours!
To sign up for a tour of Fresh Kills go to the Department of Parks & Recreation's Fresh Kills website.
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Introduction
From 2001 to 2006, the City of New York, led by the Department of City Planning, conducted a master planning process to turn the now-closed Fresh Kills Landfill on Staten Island into a world class park. The resulting Draft Master Plan will guide the site's evolution over the next thirty years. The job of implementing this plan was turned over to the Department of Parks & Recreation upon the selection of a Fresh Kills Park Administrator in 2006. This website describes the planning process, concepts and content of the Draft Master Plan.
Please go to the Department of Parks & Recreation's Fresh Kills webpage for current information on the Fresh Kills Park Project.
At 2,200 acres - almost three times the size of Central Park - New York's Fresh Kills Park will be one of the most ambitious public works projects in the world, combining state of the art ecological restoration techniques with extraordinary settings for recreation, public art, and facilities for many sports and programs that are unusual in the city. While nearly forty-five percent of the site was once used for landfilling operations, the remainder of the site is currently composed of wetlands, open waterways, and unfilled lowland areas.
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| Renderings of future parkland and recreation at Fresh Kills |
The Fresh Kills Draft Master Plan has created a blueprint for reclaiming the largest landfill in the country for public use. Fresh Kills Park will not be static but rather, will be an evolving landscape. It will grow and change just as the people who will use it. The Fresh Kills Draft Master Plan conveys through drawings, presentations and reports:
- The opportunities presented by the site over time, an outline of potential future uses, and the phased implementation and scope of those uses.
- The physical and regulatory site constraints (which, because of the nature of landfills, are considerable and will change gradually over the next 30 years).
- Visual images showing the site's appearance as new uses develop.
- A process for continuing public involvement as the plan is implemented and the park grows in response to nature and evolving community needs.
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