Community Group Wants to Shift the Shaft
The East 50's Neighborhood Coalition has filed for a preliminary injunction against the Department of Environmental Protection's planned Shaft 33B, at 59th Street and First Avenue, which would connect water mains to Water Tunnel No. 3, the city's 50-year, $6 billion infrastructure project.
The coalition contends that an alternate site between 55th and 56th streets on Third Avenue would be a better location for the shaft as it is directly over the water main trunk, obviating the need for further work that would disrupt the neighborhood. "We want [the D.E.P.] to look again at the site at 919 Third Avenue, which our engineers tell us is a viable site directly over the water mains," said Linda Saputelli, the chair of the coalition.
The coalition contends that:
*DEP had a duty to examine the environmental impacts of reasonable alternative sites, even if that would require use of its eminent domain powers. *Four years of continuous water main construction constitutes significant environmental impacts *Neighborhood residents and businesses will suffer irreparable injury if construction of Shaft 33B commencesThe coalition has been battling the D.E.P. over this issue since late last year; the D.E.P. originally wanted to get started on the excavation next spring, with a completing date sometime by 2010. Construction of the connecting water mains would begin concurrently and and finish up by 2011.
-Matthew Grace
Please save us from community groups. On August first, the New York Times had a special supplement covering Harlem Week. It was a glorious celebration of.....Gentrification. Parts of Harlem, which is generally inclusive of West, Central and East Harlem, seem to have embraced gentrification zealously. The reasons are obvious; there has been no real displacement, most of the development has been vacant buildings and the residents are benefitting from the influx of working people, professionals and developers into the area. Unfortunately, the east side has been noticeably lacking in enthusiasm and, although it has been gentrifying, the pace is slower than in other sections of Harlem. If you try and build anything other than low income housing in East Harlem, there is a public outcry. Yes, there is a place for low income housing but in moderation. Why would we want to import large numbers of low income and public dependent people when we already have an extremely large indigenous population? We obviously wouldn