Thursday, June 28, 2012 Page B1
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A river runs through it Thousands gather to celebrate community’s connection to the Hudson By Kate Pastor
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MORE THAN 5,000 people sprawled across the lawn at the College of Mount Saint Vincent, at right. Artisans and entertainers kept them busy all afternoon. GRIFFEN BRACCHITTA, below, nonchalantly surveys the river from the deck of the tugboat Cornell.
Photos by Marisol Diaz
DANNY MEJIA, Charlie Schiller and David Solomon, above, from the band Genetic Control rocked the Riverfest crowd. PABLO SOLOTAROW, 10, gets his hair colored red and blue by Marisa Uranovsky from A Touch of Sun Hair & Spa, near left. DAVID GREENBAUM, Michelle Rosenstam, Angela Rios, Matilde Morillo, bottom right, visit the tent of thecheeseguy. com. THE A. J. MEERWALD, a Delaware Bay oyster schooner built in 1928, bottom left, is now run by the Bayshore Discovery project. Fireboat John J. Harvey gives her a salute as they pass on the Hudson River. Both boats offered brief tours to RiverFest visitors.
It’s official: agency releases ‘preferred route’ for Greenway The New York Metropolitan Transpor tation Council of ficially unveiled its plan for the Bronx portion of the Hudson River Greenway at RiverFest on Sunday. The Hudson River Greenway was established in 1991 to create a series of land and water trails from West 59th Street in Manhattan to the Hudson Crossing Park Trail in upstate Saratoga County. Currently, the greenway, with bicycle and pedestrian trails, runs all
It would run from Manhattan, the way from Batter y Park in Manhattan to Troy, N.Y., excluding only across the Henr y Hudson Bridge and then traverse streets the Bronx and par t of Yonin Spuyten Duyvil to the kers. What’s riverfront. There it would The organization unonline? bridge the Metro-Nor th veiled the proposal for its tracks and run between preferred route — arrived See a final map p of them and the river’s edge at after many years of de- the Greenway at from West 232nd Street liberations and input, parriverdalepress.com the Yonkers border. ticularly from the Friends of the Hudson River GreIn 2008, the state began enway in the Bronx — to planning the route and last connect the path through Riverdale. year presented a variety of potential
paths. Among the multi-million dollar plans that have been floated was one — which was not adopted — to replace the Spuyten Duyvil Swing Bridge and another to utilize the Henr y Hudson Bridge, which made it to the final proposal. The blueprint includes a cantilevered path on the side of the bridge with enough room for two-way bike and pedestrian traf fic, at a cost of approximately $15 million.
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Congratulations To All Our Riverdale School Graduates Best of Luck in The Next Steps of Your Life Journey
t seemed as though all of Riverdale had found its way down to the Hudson shore on Sunday. The winding path to the water at the College of Mount Saint Vincent opened onto a tent village of jugglers, medieval fencers and fresh food peddlers at the third annual RiverFest, where about 5,000 people came to pay their respects to the mighty Hudson. The celebration of the waterfront, a project of the Friends of the Hudson River Greenway in the Bronx held in conjunction with a wide range of community organizations and sponsors, saw ships depart from the college’s dock, a long lineup of local musicians and engaging activities for all ages. Everywhere you turned there was an attraction. Artist Daniel Hauben may have been the only one painting a portrait of the scene, but he summed up the overwhelming sense of community that made the event so striking. “Being a sort of Bronxite and fellow Riverdalian, I met way too many people I know,” he said. “Which definitely impeded my working on this drawing.” He was one of the many artists and artisans selling their work. Everything from soaps to handmade flutes and clothing brimming with Bronx pride was on display. There was little chance for children to get bored. If they weren’t waiting for a turn on the bouncy castle, they were watching theatrics, building birds nests or handling live shellfish. The Bronx Children’s Museum parked its colorful bus in the clearing, as clowns did their best to blend into the crowd and trip up a visitor or two, and audience members lounged before the bandstand. “My son hasn’t left the Middle Ages,” said Jacqui Brown, who hasn’t missed a RiverFest. PS 24 had a button-making station and displayed a 3-D topographical map — made from Lego blocks — of Riverdale, Kingsbridge, Marble Hill and Inwood. PS 81 had kids creating artwork that depicted views of the river. Representativesof the David A. Stein Riverdale/Kingsbridge Academy, MS/ HS 141 read The Little Red Lighthouse to groups of children and gave away copies of the book — made available by Fern Jaffe, owner of former local bookstore Paperbacks Plus. After working up an appetite, visitors could choose hot food from a variety of vendors, including Liebman’s Kosher Deli and Vendy Award-winning Fauzia’s Heavenly Delights. There were treats courtesy of The Candy Box and Lloyd’s Carrot Cake and vegetables from the Riverdale Y Greenmarket. Nearly every community organization you could think of got in on the fun. But FHRGB also had a serious purpose — to help unveil the New York Metropolitan Transportation Council’s latest plan for more permanent riverfront access. The Friends — which put RiverFest together three years ago as a way to build support for the Hudson River Greenway — displayed the final proposed preferred route for the greenway’s path through Riverdale. Riverdale resident Jordan Laks, who cycled to the festival, marveled at what waterfront access would mean for his rides. “It would be nice to have an open greenway trail along this beautiful river,” he said. To that end, Greenway advocates set up information sessions in the cabin of an historic railroad barge about both the plan for a riverside trail and efforts to preserve the Hudson. Nearby, guitarist Steve Oates fingerpicked by the shore to an audience cooled by the shade and the breeze coming off the water, where fireboat John J. Harvey and sailing ship A.J. Meerwald offered rides. Off to the side, a little girl picked out purple feathers for her storytelling bag, but was still unsure of what tale she would use its feathers to remind her of. Perhaps one about a single day that brought a community together to take stock all of its many resources. Or maybe just one about clowns and candy.