By Jere Hester
“New ice skating rink all set to open at Trade Center”
Downtown Express
Dec.19, 1994 – Jan. 8, 1995
A new rink was set to open on the World Trade Center’s Austin J. Tobin Plaza on Dec. 27. The rink was going to be open all year and have in-line and roller skating during the warmer months. The Port Authority reached an agreement with Recreation World, which up until that year had run both rinks in Central Park.
“This is a major new amenity for Lower Manhattan, said the authority’s executive director, George J. Marlin.
Carole Sumner Krechman, Recreation World’s C.E.O. pledged to “bring new energy into this area of Manhattan.”
Dr. Lewis Gross, active in Downtown Little League, said it would be nice to take his family somewhere closer than Central Park to ice skate, and that he hoped to start roller and ice hockey leagues.
The Port Authority also planned to build an escalator connection from the plaza to the shopping mall and bring in new retail shops and restaurants, of which Borders was one.
The rink ended up failing after a snowy winter forced it to close many days. Recreation World and the Port blamed each other for not living up to the contract and the operator filed a lawsuit.
“Four Teens Nabbed in BPC Cabbie Murder”
& “Neighborhood Surprised by Arrests”
Battery News
December 18, 1989
Acting on a tip, police arrested four Tribeca teenagers in the murder of cab driver Wellington Yee-Yick back in January of that year, Battery Park City’s first ever murder.
Yee-Yick, a 41 year old cab driver, was shot once in the left side of the head with a .25 caliber bullet shortly before 1 a.m. on Jan. 5 on West Thames St. at the southern end of Battery Park City’s residential neighborhood. Police believed the suspects, all 18, hailed the cab in another part of town and told him to drive to the deserted area and killed him when he struggled during the attempted robbery.
Yee-Yick was found in a pool of blood in his cab by two cops on routine neighborhood patrol 200 ft. west of South End Ave.
The victim’s wife described her husband as a devoted family man who doted on their twin 15-year-old daughters.
Some of the suspects lived in Independence Plaza North.
“It’s generally pretty quiet down here,” said I.P.N. resident Harold Donohue. “There’s a lot of stability. The biggest news here is usually when the elevators break down.”
— Prepared by Helaina N. Hovitz
