BPCA Will Review Updated Designs for Resiliency Measures at Public Session Tonight
This afternoon and evening (Monday, June 26), the Battery Park City Authority (BPCA) will host a pair of public meeting about its North/West Battery Park City Resiliency Project at Stuyvesant High School (345 Chambers Street), starting at 4:30pm and 6:30pm. All interested persons are invited to attend.
The meetings will review the current design status for the BPCA’s North/West Battery Park City Resiliency Project, which envisions protective measures along the northern and western sections of the community to reduce the risks associated with storm surge and sea level rise.
The session will give participants an overview of evolving plans for the creation of a flood-risk management system stretching from a point near First Place and the Esplanade in the neighborhood’s southern section, where it will connect with the BPCA’s South Battery Park City Resiliency Project, which is now beginning construction. From this southern anchor, the North/West Battery Park City Resiliency Project (NWBPCR) will proceed along the Hudson River waterfront to behind Stuyvesant High School, before turning north and then east into Tribeca, where it will terminate at a highpoint on Greenwich Street, north of Chambers Street.
With early budget estimates pegging construction costs at approximately $630 million, the Authority’s plans for resiliency along the Esplanade divide the scope of the project into seven “reaches”—discrete stretches of waterfront and adjacent upland acreage. Tonight’s session (the tenth in a series of public discussions dedicated to NWBPCR) will focus on Reach Six (covering the Esplanade between North Cove Marina and South Cove) and Reach Seven (South Cove).
Reach One falls entirely outside of Battery Park City, enveloping part of Tribeca, the Borough of Manhattan Community College and the Hudson River Park south of North Moore Street, where the flood barrier system will be comprised of a combination of passive and deployable structures that “tie‐back” to higher ground at Greenwich Street. The final path of this alignment remains undecided, with routes along either North Moore Street or Chambers Street still under consideration.
Reach Two encompasses the North Esplanade (behind Stuyvesant High School). In this section, a passive flood protection structure will be concealed within a terraced garden landscape, with a new platform built three feet higher than the current elevation and extending further into the adjacent water than the present configuration.
In Reach Three, the design team has focused on the construction of a flood barrier aligned at the farthest feasible line east of the waterfront, adjacent to River Terrace. This would include a passive structure with deployable systems at park entrances and pedestrian crossings, as well as wave attenuation measures within the existing park. While this design aims to minimize impacts to the existing Rockefeller Park lawn and its waterfront views, it will likely entail some changes to portions of the park’s grading and the addition of drainage infrastructure, along with some tree clearing and replacement along River Terrace.
In Reach Four, one approach under consideration involves a newly-elevated platform with flood defense components integrated into the design, which would split the Esplanade and adjacent Plaza into two different levels. In this version of the plan, the playground and the surrounding area would be elevated, including the lily pond, which could be replaced with a new water feature. (This concept also envisions the temporary relocation of the ferry terminal, roughly one block northward, eventually bringing it back to the current location, near the foot of Vesey Street, once work is complete.) As part of this evening’s meeting, the design team will discuss with attendees these and other potential options for Reaches Three and Four.
Reach Five envisions ways to harden North Cove Marina against catastrophic flooding, with protection provided by a passive structure integrated into terraced planting, located inland from the waterfront. This will require both passive structure and deployable structures for access between upper and lower levels.
In Reach Six, the flood barrier system will be comprised of a combination of a flood wall (skirting the edges of the residential buildings that line the Esplanade) and deployable structures located where three streets (Albany Street, Rector Place, and West Thames Street) end at the Esplanade.
For Reach Seven, preliminary plans call for South Cove to be encompassed (at the edges of the buildings that surround it) by a flood wall, interrupted by deployable measures where First, Second, and Third Places terminate at the edge of the waterfront parkland.
The presentations at tonight’s meetings (which will be identical—the two sessions are intended to facilitate the broadest possible attendance) will incorporate feedback received from the public in a series half a dozen previous sessions, which began last fall and concluded this spring. The overall project has now reached 30 percent design completion.
No reservation or advanced registration is required. Doors open at 4pm. For more information about NWBPCR, please visit bpca.ny.gov/nwbpcr/ or email: nwbpcrinfo@bpca.ny.gov.