Hudson River Park: A name that works

Editorial

The name Hudson River Park has always been just fine with everybody. It perfectly describes and locates the 5-mile-long Lower West Side waterfront park between Chambers and W. 59th Sts.

But on Monday The New York Sun reported that Governor Eliot Spitzer in his State of the State address on Wednesday will propose renaming the park after George Pataki, who was governor for the 12 years before Spitzer.

In 1998 Pataki signed legislation authorizing the creation of the Hudson River Park, along with the state-city development agency called the Hudson River Park Trust. Pataki then funneled millions of state dollars to the project.

Certainly, Pataki can name Hudson River Park among other impressive environmental accomplishments of his tenure; such as acquiring tracts of Upstate land and protecting endangered forests and lakes. But Spitzer’s renaming proposal, called by the New York Sun “an unexpected, gracious gift to a Republican who has begun to fade from the public eye”, is misguided.

Clearly, Spitzer has endured a horrendous first year as governor, highlighted — or, rather, lowlighted — by the Troopergate scandal. No doubt, renaming Hudson River Park as Pataki Park is Spitzer’s extending an olive branch to Bruno. Yes, the two definitely should patch things up so that Albany functions again and Spitzer can accomplish his agenda. Yet none of the Trust’s board or staff or the local elected officials whose districts include the park was notified of the renaming idea. Spitzer still has to learn more about building consensus.

Without detracting from Pataki’s impressive contributions to Hudson River Park — should the park, in fact, be renamed? Manhattan’s largest parks are not named after people or politicians: Central Park, Riverside Park, East River Park, Battery Park. Tompkins Square — named after Daniel Tompkins, who was a governor, congressman and vice president — is an exception. The New York City Parks Department’s own policy for renaming parks for people is to wait at least until after the person is deceased. Some local park activists polled by Chelsea Now strongly oppose the renaming; others would support it, though less than enthusiastically.

No one we’ve spoken to feels that “Pataki Park” would make one whit’s difference in terms of the park’s funding it from Albany, and it might actually hurt. More to the point, a formal name change would apparently need a change of the Hudson River Park Act. Assemblymember Deborah Glick says she wouldn’t support such a change, meaning Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver likely would follow suit.

Furthermore, opening up the park act for an amendment risks other amendments being inserted at this sensitive time that could harm the park — such as an amendment to allow a marine waste transfer station on Gansevoort Peninsula or one to allow a 50-year lease at Pier 40, which would facilitate Related’s Cirque du Soleil proposal.

On Tuesday, we heard Spitzer might have pulled the Pataki Park renaming from his speech, because, it’s said, the former governor would not be in attendance. (Maybe that’s because Spitzer, at his inaugural speech last year, said state government had “slept like Rip Van Winkle” the previous decade.) The Trust itself declined comment and referred our questions to the Governor’s Office, indicative of the confusion going on here.

Parks — and their names — are important to local community members. More so than with most parks, Hudson River Park from its start has been a real community effort, from its initial brainstorming to its design and ongoing critical development concerns, such as Pier 40 and Gansevoort.

We’re heartened to see Spitzer take an interest in the Park. Yet — without any disrespect for Pataki’s efforts on behalf of the park — we think the name Hudson River Park is perfection itself. It defines the park, it says where it is and it refers to a wondrous natural feature that has been here for eons — a river that is the very reason why New York City exists, and is more important than any single one of us, including ex-governors.