It is one of the most polluted waterways in the country. It’s at the crux of efforts to restore health and improve access to New York’s waterways. And from the vantage point of a small motorboat, Newtown Creek somehow manages to be beautiful.
The bay is considered the crown jewel of the city’s green spaces, home to hundreds of species of birds, fishes and marine life. It’s a ecosystem unique within the entire Northeast coast just a hour subway ride from downtown Manhattan. The proximity to the city makes Jamaica Bay a unique wild environment in urban setting but is also its major threat.
Along Newtown Creek and Jamaica Bay, decades of work are slowly restoring neglected waterways. Now comes a new challenge: Making sure New Yorkers can use those liquid assets in harmony with industry and nature.
The mayor’s citywide ferry plan could face challenges dealing with operating costs and the development of a market, but supporters say its value to the city includes offering a more of transit that will work even if the lights are out.
Maternal morbidity—moms who get really sick before or after childbirth, sometimes with years-long effects—is a growing problem in New York. Racial health disparities are part of the picture, but so is the uneven quality of the hospitals different communities use.
Aquaponics relies on the interaction of fish, whose waste feeds the plants, and plants, whose digestive process purifies the water. But at Oko Farms in Brooklyn, success also depends on the relationship between the farm and its neighborhood.
For years, New York City has wrestled with the impact of combined sewer overflows on local rivers, creeks, canals and bays. But while raw sewage is certainly a problem, simple rainwater might pose an environmental challenge that’s harder to address.
A veto-proof majority of the New York City Council has signed on as co-sponsors of a law that would push residents to install a kind of smoke detector that might be more likely to save lives than the type frequently found in city homes.
An already belated effort to bring city rivers and bays up to Clean Water Act standards appears to have stalled because of a legal dispute involving Albany’s approval of the city’s cleanup plans.
News that Beth Israel Hospital will downsize is just the latest spasm in a rapidly consolidating hospital marketplace. The theory is that patients will benefit from efficiencies. Experience says otherwise.
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