Seabury Playground

SEABURY PARK REOPENS AFTER $777K RENOVATION

First Bronx Community Parks Initiative Site to Open—One of 18 Planned in the Bronx

NYC Parks Commissioner Mitchell J. Silver, FAICP today joined NYC Parks Bronx Borough Commissioner Iris Rodriguez-Rosa, NYC DEP Director of Stormwater Management Outreach Mikelle Adgate, New York City Councilmember Rafael Salamanca, Jr. and students from the East Bronx Academy for the Future to cut the ribbon on the newly reconstructed Seabury Park. The park design is based on feedback gathered directly from the community at public input sessions. Seabury Park is the first Community Parks Initiative (CPI) site to open in the Bronx after undergoing full reconstruction and was funded by Mayor Bill de Blasio wih $777,000.

Seabury Park has undergone a complete transformation and now features a new multi-use court designed for basketball, volleyball, street games and other sports. A seating area with benches and picnic tables has also been added along with new trees and other plantings.

“Before this renovation, eighty percent of Seabury Park was closed to the public because of sinking pavement and other unsafe conditions,” said Commissioner Silver. “Today, this park is opening in full and has received a complete makeover. I know this revamped park will be heavily used by children at the East Bronx Academy, who have played on these courts daily for many years. Seabury Park is just the beginning—the Community Parks Initiative will fully renovate 17 additional Bronx parks in high-poverty areas, some of which are already underway.”

To manage storm water runoff, green infrastructure has been added throughout Seabury Park in coordination with the NYC Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). Green features include a rain garden, underground storm chambers, permeable concrete and flood-tolerant plants. DEP has committed approximately $50 million in funding for green infrastructure installations at CPI sites throughout the city, helping to reduce sewer overflows that sometimes occur during heavy rainfall, improve air quality and lower summertime temperatures.

“DEP is proud to be a partner in NYC Parks’ Community Parks Initiative which is transforming neighborhood parks across the city,” said Commissioner Sapienza. “We are always looking for ways in which we can reduce the water that enters our sewer system to help mitigate the risk of CSO’s, and we were able to do just that with this project at Seabury Park in the Bronx. The newly installed green infrastructure at this playground will help to reduce stormwater runoff, improve the health of the surrounding waterways, and beautify the neighborhood.”

“These are the types of investments needed in the South Bronx,” said Councilmember Salamanca. “The Mid Bronx Desperadoes saw the need for greenspace here twenty years ago, and I’m pleased that the city is building on their commitment to the community by this sizable investment to renovate Seabury Park.”

Launched by Mayor de Blasio in October 2014, CPI aims to create a more equitable parks system by investing in parks that are located in New York City’s densely-populated neighborhoods with higher-than-average concentrations of poverty. CPI is investing $318 million in capital dollars to reconstruct 67 parks citywide that have not undergone significant improvements in decades, including 18 Bronx parks.

Since Commissioner Silver came to Parks in 2014, the agency has taken on more projects and finished them faster. At any given time, NYC Parks has roughly 500 capital projects in development, and continues to work to bring New Yorkers better parks faster. In addition to unveiling the Parks Capital Tracker, bringing transparency to the process, steps Parks has taken to reduce the average length of the capital process by five months includes, lessening the average number of days in construction by 99; reducing change orders by 78 percent, and receiving PDC design approvals 83 percent of the time on first submissions, up from 20 percent prior.

Formerly an abandoned lot, Seabury was established as a park in 1997 with support from the Mid-Bronx Desperadoes community group. The park’s name can be traced to Samuel Seabury (1710-1796), rector of St. Peter’s Church at Westchester Square.