BY ZACH WILLIAMS | A Community Board 4 (CB4) committee is calling upon the Parks Department to address quality-of-life issues at local playgrounds in the remaining time before long-awaited renovations begin on two local parks.
The presence of private exercise groups, unaccompanied adults and pot-smoking teens in play areas utilized by local children was discussed at the May 14 meeting of the CB4 Waterfront, Parks, and Environment Committee held at the community board’s office at 330 W. 42nd St. (26th floor). The committee decided to reach out to the department in an informal manner in order to secure more supervision of the public spaces as well as conduct a quick fix on a troublesome gate at Matthews-Palmer Playground (W. 45th St. btw. Ninth & 10th Aves.).
Members of the committee said at the meeting that a simple telephone call to Steve Simon, chief of staff for Manhattan parks, would yield a better response than a formal letter, which could needlessly instigate a “testy” situation. The purpose of the softer approach is to convince the department to address issues in the short-term before the park begins construction work at the playground as well as Hell’s Kitchen Park (10th Ave. btw. W. 47th & W. 48th Sts.).
A little perseverance goes a long way with department bureaucrats, according to committee member Jean-Daniel Noland, who gave the committee an update on upcoming construction at the two sites.
“It’s an incredible amount of aggravation that the community has to pressure Parks to get anything done,” he said. “As you probably know it’s not Parks’ fault all the time. They have limited resources. They are pulled politically by this and that, but if you have somebody who persists eventually you get something done.”
Several million dollars in funding secured by former City Councilmember Christine Quinn will overhaul both sites. Construction will begin at Hell’s Kitchen Park as soon as next month. Planned work includes the reconstruction of pavement, fences, plantings and plumbing. The project to construct Matthews-Palmer Playground, meanwhile, is currently in the design stage, which will likely conclude at about the same time. Work will likely begin early next spring and take about one year to finish, according to the department.
In the meantime, the installation of a simple latch rather than the current heavy bar would make a big difference in ensuring that those entering and leaving the playground properly close the gate, according to Eliyanna Kaiser, who often brings her two young sons there. She told the committee that adults crowding the children’s play area, as well as drug use at the park, threatens the family-friendly ambience.
“That makes things tense and uncomfortable for children, particularly children of special needs who may be afraid,” she said.
A similar problem reportedly afflicts Dr. Gertrude B. Kelly Playground on W. 17th St. (btw. Eighth & Ninth Aves.), where exercise groups from the nearby Brick New York gym congregate. Ongoing litigation between the gym and neighborhood residents precludes the former from using their exercise facilities at 257 W. 17th St. for the time being. A representative of the gym told Chelsea Now that the gym does utilize the playground and other public spaces for workouts because of that issue. The representative then requested that further questions be submitted by email. No response was received by press time.
Visitors to the playground said on May 17 that they have noticed the exercise groups but their presence has not been particularly detrimental to them or their children. Bands of teenagers dominated the jungle gym on the afternoon of May 18 shortly after the end of the school day, but no little children were present at that time. A similar situation played out at Matthews-Palmer Playground, where another group of teens loitered near the play area that day.
“If I do see [exercise groups] it’s early in the morning…they don’t really intrude on the kids,” said Tiffany Vargas, a resident of W. 17th St. who frequents Dr. Gertrude B. Kelly Playground.
Matthews-Palmer is not perfect, but nonetheless the teenagers and other adults sitting in the play area did not prevent Sean Kirkpatrick from playing there with his two-year-old son on May 18. The Mississippi resident however conceded that his experience with the playground has only included a few visits.
“For the most part, I don’t think that safety has been compromised,” he said.
According to Sarah Ireland, a resident of W. 34th St., there are plenty of local teens smoking pot, using foul language and engaging in soft-core romantic activity at Hell’s Kitchen Park. But in an area of the city noticeably lacking in available public spaces, Ireland makes do.
“It’s Hell’s Kitchen,” she said. “Where else will they go?”
Garden volunteer Jane Greenlaw said the place can reek of marijuana smoke at times, though a truancy officer does sporadically patrol the area at Hell’s Kitchen Park. But as she considered the issue of exercise groups, and infringements on children’s play areas by adults and teens, a different nemesis emerged in the form of a little boy trampling her treasured foliage nearby.
“The lack of supervision of children is the key issue,” she said after she issued a stern admonishment to the boy.
