Bathroom break might wait

Bathroom break might wait
by Patrick Rocchio

You gotta wait!

Thousands of visitors to Ferry Point Park’s soccer fields and baseball diamonds summer weekends are not told that directly, but they certainly get the message when they find there are no working restrooms on the west side of the park.

Community Board 10 and Ferry Point Park Advocate group leader Dotti Poggi are calling on the Parks Department to speed up construction of a planned comfort station in that area of the park.

Thousands of people use the soccer fields on a busy weekend, said Poggi. “To me, it is just one big health hazard over there,” said Poggi, noting that she and other park volunteers find used tampons, diapers – and worse – in wooded areas on the west side of the park.

Plans for a new comfort station have been in the works since construction on the first of two phases of park upgrades began in November 2008.

But the situation is not likely to change this summer. A new comfort station for the west side of the Park has been slated for construction for the summer of next year, said Parks Department spokesman Philip Abramson.

“We anticipate beginning construction by Summer 2014,” Abramson said in an e-mail. “The project required a redesign to change utility layouts and to incorporate review comments into the final design.”

A new contractor also has to be hired for the comfort station, he said. This after another contractor opted out of the project in 2011.

Board 10 has written to the Parks Department asking them to expedite construction on the comfort station to make the park more welcoming and clean. The board also wants Parks to make needed repairs and upgrades, including removing dead trees and fixing a pot-holed road that leads under the Whitestone Bridge in the park.

“I don’t know what the delay is,” CB 10 district manager Kenneth Kearns said of the comfort station. “The money is dedicated and the design is done.”

Parkgoers need to be responsible for themselves and remove debris from the park when they leave, said CB 10 chariman John Marano, who is also pushing to speed up work on public restroom.

“It is definitely something that is needed in Ferry Point Park,” said Marano.

Meanwhile, he added, “I would like see more Port-O-Sans as a temporary fix until the construction of the permanent bathrooms.”

Patrick Rocchio can be reach via e-mail at [email protected] or by phone at (718) 742-3393