Crumbling LIC Shoreline Must Be Rebuilt, Opened Up, Advocates Say

LONG ISLAND CITY, QUEENS — Neighborhood leaders are escalating calls to repair a collapsing section of the Long Island City shoreline, saying the rapidly-eroding blockfront could soon swallow a city street.

Concerns have swirled for years around the bulkhead along 29th Street between 47th and Hunters Point avenues, which overlooks the Dutch Kills tributary of Newtown Creek.

At least three major collapses have left the fenced-off bulkhead crumbling into the creek, which is also littered with abandoned barges, discarded tires, concrete blocks, and other debris. It is only a matter of time before even more of the shoreline falls into the water, according to advocates including the Newtown Creek Alliance.

On Friday, residents and elected officials gathered at the bulkhead to renew their demands that the city repair the shoreline — while also sharing a new set of designs that show its potential as a healthy, publicly-accessible waterfront.

"We have so many of us here saying enough is enough and we deserve to have access to this beautiful creek," said City Councilmember Julie Won, who was joined at Friday's event by Queens Borough President Donovan Richards, State Assembly nominee Juan Ardila, members of Community Board 2, and staffers for U.S. Reps. Carolyn Maloney and Nydia Velazquez.

The group also unveiled new designs, created by the firm Interval Projects, that reimagine the 29th Street bulkhead as a restored salt marsh with terraced seating and benches, trees and sidewalks, and a kayak launch stretching into Newtown Creek.

That effort has the support of nearby LaGuardia Community College, a space-starved institution whose students have pushed for more open space near their campus, as well as adjacent small businesses like 21st Century Storage, Broadway Stages and Hunters Point Recycling.

Their campaign is targeted at the MTA, which owns the bulkhead land; the Department of Transportation, which maintains the nearby streets; and the state Department of Environmental Conservation, which has authority over polluted waterways. Previous pleas earlier this year from CB2 and the Newtown Creek Alliance have not yielded any visible action from the agencies.

In a statement, MTA spokesperson Dave Steckel told Patch: "We are working with State and City partners to ensure there is a comprehensive plan of action to protect the roadway and integrity of the bulkhead by mitigating any future deterioration."

DEC did not respond to a request for comment.

There would be precedent for such a waterway restoration, advocates argue: in recent years, the city restored marsh habitats blocks away on Newtown Creek, at Hunter's Point Park South, and at Hallets Cove in Astoria.

Interval Projects' design for the 29th Street bulkhead is part of a larger proposal known as Dutch Kills Loop, which calls for the creation of a 1.4-mile-long circuit of walkways, bridges and parks around the Long Island City waterfront.

"We are calling on our agencies to get their act together," Borough President Richards said Friday. "Now is not a time for bureaucracy. Now is the time for the cure, to begin using our waterways more broadly.”