Elizabeth Street Garden

 

The Elizabeth Street Garden is a one-acre community sculpture garden in Nolita on Elizabeth Street between Prince and Spring Streets. 

It’s an area of Manhattan sadly lacking green spaces so I could immediately see the garden’s appeal.

It is mostly shaded – welcome on the 90-degree days that are becoming more common thanks to global warming.

And it is filled with chairs and tables far enough from each other to offer privacy for a lunch with friends or remote work.

 

The space was born in 1990 when it was leased to Allan Reiver owner of the Elizabeth Street Gallery.

He cleared it of garbage, planted trees and flowers, added paths, and statues from his own collection.  In 2005, he opened it to the public

Plans to destroy the garden began in September 2012 when City Council Member Margaret Chin worked with the Bloomberg Administration to get the land – owned by the Board of Education – transferred to the NYC Housing Authority with no public review or record.

In June 2013 members of the community became aware of the plans to destroy the garden and organized. Chin maintains her stance calling the garden a “vacant lot.” 

As you can see from these photos it is clearly anything but.

 Sadly, de Blasio and now Adams also support demolishing the garden.  Plans were filed in 2019 to use the lot for affordable housing.  Shortly thereafter ESG (Elizabeth Street Garden, Inc.) filed a lawsuit to prevent building.

A few weeks ago, Robert De Niro, Martin Scorsese and Patti Smith added their efforts to the “Save the Garden” cause.

But, with demolition scheduled to begin on September 10^th, I figured I had better visit immediately if I wanted to see it.  I am glad that I did. I would have hated to miss it.

https://www.elizabethstreetgarden.com/

“They paved paradise and put up a parking lot.”  Big Yellow Taxi - Joni Mitchell : 1970

 

Ciao

PJ

 

© 2024 PJ Lehrer