The
New York Times
New
Jersey section
by Steve Strunsky
Mar 19, 2006
“Creating
Liberty State Park from the Outside In”
STEVE AND MEGAN
TRASK had spent a recent morning at Liberty State Park and were returning to
their car in a lot along Freedom Way when they paused near a vast wooded area
surrounded by a fence with signs warning, ''No Trespassing: Hazardous Materials
Area.''
''We moved here,
two or three years ago, and you look at a map and it shows this huge mass of
land that says it's Liberty State Park,'' said Mr. Trask, a pharmaceutical
marketing consultant. ''But then you find out it's only 60 percent usable.''
(park is 600 acres above water and 600 acres under water.)
Mr. Trask was not
far off in his estimate. June will mark the 30th anniversary of Liberty State
Park. But even as a waterfront walkway, picnic areas and playgrounds have been
created around the perimeter for the enjoyment of almost 5 million visitors a
year, the park's 234-acre interior portion has remained undeveloped and off
limits.
But under a plan
developed over several years by the United States Army Corps of Engineers, the
State Department of Environmental Protection, private environmentalists and park
watchdogs, the interior of Liberty State Park is to be flooded using a salt
creek that will be dug as a link to New York Harbor. In turn, this will create a
tidal marsh surrounded by forest and grasslands, and crisscrossed with miles of
boardwalks and footpaths.
The project,
which is expected to cost the state and federal government an estimated $32
million and take five years, is scheduled to begin early next year after the
engineering plans are complete.
There have been
previous plans to develop the park's interior, including proposals for a theme
park, a residential complex and most recently, a controversial golf course. The
course, put forth as a way to finance development of the interior without
taxpayer funds, was squashed by Gov. Christie Whitman in 1995 amid criticism
that even a public course would be too exclusive for such a cherished public
space.
That and the
other previous plans lacked a consensus among elected officials, policy makers
and the public, including the influential Friends of Liberty State Park, a
citizens' group headed by Sam Pesin, the son of Morris Pesin, a community
activist who conceived of the park and pushed for its creation.
''My dad would be
so excited that his vision of a family park behind the Statue of Liberty has
continued to blossom in so many ways,'' said Mr. Pesin, whose father died in
1992. ''It's a recreational resource, a cultural resource and a natural
resource.''
The park was
established in 1976, nine years after the Central Railroad of New Jersey went
bankrupt and halted service to its waterfront terminal on land now occupied by
the park. Yet while most of the terminal was restored to its Victorian splendor,
and the 1.5-mile waterfront walkway was built to provide exquisite views of
Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty just off shore, the interior portion of
the park was neglected.
Gradually, the
interior has grown into a kind of post-industrial urban wilderness, with
overgrowth masking most traces of the rail yards, which had been created in the
19th century using garbage, dredge materials and blasted bedrock to fill in
hundreds of acres of natural salt marshlands. To this day, uprooted railroad
ties with rusted spikes are scattered amid bayberry bushes, sumac, white pine
and gray birch trees that sprout from glinting coal cinders.
''There's
remnants of the old railroad all over the place,'' said Frank Gallagher, the
park administrator, the very image of a naturalist -- with his well-worn hiking
boots -- as he led visitors on a tour.
Dozens of bird
species, including red-tailed hawks and goldfinch (New Jersey's state bird) as
well as rabbit, fox and other wildlife inhabit the area. Wild turkeys have been
spotted by park rangers.
The fence and
warning signs went up as a result of a lawsuit against the state filed in 1993
by the Interfaith Community Organization, which also forced the current cleanup
of four acres next to the park's interpretive center on Freedom Way. Joe Morris,
the interfaith group's chromium cleanup project director, praised the salt marsh
project, but said the money would be better spent on residential cleanups. (Greg
Remaud, preservation director for New York/New Jersey Baykeeper, explained that
New Jersey’s Natural Resources Damages program which brought 10 million
dollars to LSP, from a settlement with polluting companies, to restore those 4
acres and for use in the Interior Restoration, needed to be spent on restoring a
natural area, and wasn’t meant for residential area clean-ups).
Under the
project, a total of 36 acres would be converted to salt marsh, fed by a creek up
to 8 feet deep and 100 feet wide. Another 28 acres would be freshwater wetlands,
fed by rainwater runoff from parking lots and the roof of the nearby Liberty
Science Center. A berm built up to eight feet high would occupy 30 acres of the
site's northwest corner, to act as a sight and sound buffer against the New
Jersey Turnpike Extension. About 100 acres would be woodland, with some 60 acres
of grass.
In certain hot
spots, soil containing higher concentrations of contaminants will be removed,
said Greg Remaud, preservation director for New York/New Jersey Baykeeper, who
helped plan the project (and moved it forward). In a cost-saving element,
several hundred thousand cubic yards of earth dug up for the salt creek is to be
used for the berm and as a layer of topsoil to cap lightly contaminated areas.
The state's $11.5
million share of the cost includes $10 million in penalties assessed to
companies held responsible for chromium contamination. There is no federal money
budgeted for the project, but the Army Corps is hopeful that, with state funding
already in place and strong support from New Jersey's new United States Senator,
Robert Menendez, the federal government's $20 million share will be allocated
soon, said William F. Slezak, chief of the corps' New York and New Jersey Harbor
Programs Branch.
In the meantime, officials
said work would begin using the state money, which by itself would pay for the
salt creek and 10 acres of marsh.