On Saturday, October 25, even though many It’s My Park Days were cancelled throughout NYC (due to the projected rain forecast), our volunteers from Monsignor Scanlan High School, led by Friends of Ferry Point Park, were willing and able to complete a successful volunteer day, rain or shine.
Over 60 volunteers joined to plant daffodils around the semi circle of the 9/11 Memorial Hilltop Viewshed Grove.
Along with this event we are also preparing for our November 8 Tree Stewardship at the park. To help prepare, Eddie Hernandez, our new manager of Ferry Point Park, had parks employees cut the weeds and clean the south cascading stairs from the hilltop to the East River.
The beautifying jobs were split up to achieve the most in the four-hour event.
While a few of the stronger volunteers (Tthank you Andre for your help) with shovels and hoes, cut around the hilltop semi circle to prepare the area for planting, others raked leaves and bagged them.
Others then used hand tools to deepen the holes and place the bulbs in the proper spot. The ground was unusually hard. We believe there was an old layer of asphalt in this area from past paths. Quite a few tools were broken throughout the day.
When the large hilltop semi circle was planted with bulbs, some volunteers shoveled and dragged compost in black plastic bags to put nourishing compost on top of the bulbs. (We have no wheelbarrows yet.) Thank you, Tom Russo, for the compost. We will return to use it all, with wheel barrows and shovels.
While all this was going on, another group of 15 volunteers painted the BBQ tables and some garbage cans located at the hilltop BBQ area that overlooks the East River. This BBQ area has one of the best views of the Manhattan Skyline from a NYC Park and the BBQ tables look clean and inviting to all now. Snack time brought bags of various chips/pretzels and water for the volunteers and park people.
We look forward to the spring to see the hilltop 9/11 Memorial Grove blossom for the first time. We hope to continue our plantings to transform the hilltop into a garden that we had on our master plan so many years ago.
On November 6, at 11:30 a.m., there will be a ground breaking on Balcolm Avenue to start the many construction projects planned for the future of Ferry Point Park.
Projects:
• Balcolm Avenue Community Park (east side, along Balcolm, across from the Throggs Neck Houses).
• Waterfront promenade (east side along the crescent shaped shoreline).
• Ferry Point Comfort Station with Park headquarters and storage (undetermined, maybe the hilltop where it originally was).
• Synthetic soccer field (west side near Schley and Brush avenues).
• Phase 2 of the construction (west side many paths and some stone benches, promenade, cricket fields, baseball, parking lot).
• Golf Course paid for by the Mayoral Funds of NYC.
