[NYguy]

NY Times

At a Longstanding Playground, Yet Another Plan to End the Games

By ALEX MINDLIN
April 1, 2007

The undistinguished little playground at First Avenue and 42nd Street, just south of the United Nations, has been tempting developers for years. Though it is called Robert Moses Playground, it is not much of a tribute to the master builder: a windswept 1.3-acre patch of painted asphalt, used by children, dog walkers and a roller hockey league.

In 1981, Harry Helmsley tried and failed to acquire the playground from the city to construct a 50-story glass tower. And in 2002, Mayor Bloomberg began pushing a plan to build a United Nations office building on part of the site. The State Legislature rejected that proposal in 2005.

Now the playground is back in play. Staff members from the office of Daniel Doctoroff, the city’s deputy mayor for economic development, have met with most of the legislators representing the neighborhood over the last two months, pitching a plan for a 35-story tower that would consolidate United Nations offices now housed in widely scattered city-owned buildings.
Because it involves taking parkland, the plan would require approval in the Legislature.

Janel Patterson, a spokeswoman for the city’s Economic Development Corporation, said that residents would be compensated for the park’s loss by a planned esplanade and bike path along the East River. “The esplanade park would be more than three times the size of Robert Moses,” she said in an e-mail message.

But the playground is 66 years old, and many neighbors say the esplanade is no substitute for this longstanding neighborhood institution. “What they’re proposing is park space for jogging or biking, or for people to sit on a bench and look at the river,” said Brian Kavanagh, the local state assemblyman. “That’s no replacement for a playground that’s used for active sports and kids running around.”

The playground’s most faithful constituency is the East End Hockey League, a roller hockey league that plays five games a weekend there and has used the playground since 1972, often lobbying fiercely for its preservation. Jack Collins, the group’s longtime president, generally plays goalie or defense, a position that strikes him as apt. “There’s a lot of defense going on these days,” he said.

Mr. Collins was skeptical about the group’s chances of finding a replacement space, in one of the city’s least green community districts. “I don’t see where there’s an alternative,” he said. “This is a modest space, but it’s someplace where you can use your imagination and make the most of a little playground.”

ALEX MINDLIN