Three years after a disastrous “upgrade,” scars limit recovering Southpoint Park, but ambitious efforts are in place. New leadership at RIOC focused on better upkeep while Roosevelt Islanders creatively pitched in.
by David Stone
The Roosevelt Island Daily News
Taking a long view, the photo above, courtesy of Judith Berdy and the Roosevelt Island Historical Society (RIHS), captures the Smallpox Hospital in 2008, a few years before the creation of Southpoint Park.
There was a long way to go. It’s been a bumpy ride.
Recovering Southpoint Park
Under the leadership of RIOC‘s then President/CEO Susan Rosenthal, a plan developed with Langan ravaged much of Southpoint Park, ripping out vegetation, chasing away animal species. While the idea was to secure the shorelines, the plan went much further and discarded developed resident preferences.
As was its custom, RIOC never explained.
Any recovery of Southpoint Park will be limited. Bulldozed shorelines replaced by rocks are hardly the more natural settings promised. And lackadaisical landscaping and maintenance has only deepened the shortcomings.
But today, new – if interim – leadership at RIOC is improving appearances Island-wide. Southpoint is no exception. Where invasive weeds dominated a year ago, progressive landscaping is giving plant designs a chance to thrive.
“What a miracle in Southpoint Park,” RIHS president Judith Berdy remarked in a note to RIOC. “After ragtag years of weeds, I see the entire park is well groomed, mulched and looks beautiful.”
As a tourist attraction, Manhattan skyline viewpoints draw and hold visitors as well as Roosevelt Islanders.
Adding On and the Future
In the years since the shoreline devastation, the Smallpox Hospital, a bit detached from the rest of the park, continued attracting visitors. The remains of the Renwick-designed facility give off a historic sense of a past now foreign to New York City.
More significantly, the FDR Hope Memorial and the World Wildlife Foundation‘s progressive animal sanctuary kept the interior stable. Year-round, visitors stroll in and around the sites.
But this year, a tiny urban forest set up in a neglected area of the park drew international attention.
The urban forest idea enhances available space in urban settings by planting trees very close together, forcing them to grow more vertically than usual in the hunt for life-giving sunlight.
This revolutionary response to the challenges of climate change encourages a plan The Daily suggested earlier. That is, stop shaving all of the open fields and slopes as if they were lawns. Recovering Southpoint Park can be improved by letting nature do its thing.
Finally, A Look Back…
Clearly, Southpoint Park has come a long way. There have been bumps and bruises. Some will never heal, but today, momentum is strong in recovering some of what was lost and imaginatively stepping up with fresh ideas.
The partnership between RIOC and the community is dynamic. Pat them all on the back: The Roosevelt Island Disabled Association; Wildlife Freedom Foundation, iDig2Learn and the Historical Society in tandem with RIOC.
You can’t beat working together.
AVAC Is Working. The Model Is What’s Aging.
Roosevelt Island’s AVAC system is often discussed as if it were either a miracle or a menace. In truth, it is neither. It is functioning infrastructure that has reached a point in its lifecycle where how it is maintained matters as much as whether it exists at all.
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