An empty lot below the Brooklyn side of the Kosciuszko Bridge is on track to become a new, innovative open space. Envisioned as a “destination park,” similar to Domino Park and The High Line, the seven-acre space under the bridge will have areas for recreation, programming, ecological landscapes, as well as a connection to the neighborhood’s Newtown Creek.
In 2017, the state called upon the North Brooklyn Parks Alliance to activate the empty lot in Greenpoint, below the bridge between Varick and Scott Avenues, and give it back to the public. The parks conservancy tapped Canadian architecture firm Public Work—which is also behind The Bentway, a park built under a Toronto expressway—to design the space.
“Greenpoint and Williamsburg [are] in desperate need for more parkland,” says Katie Denny Horowitz, executive director of North Brooklyn Parks Alliance. “Most of the parks are quite small—and you have wonderful parks like McCarren and McGolrick—but there is a high demand for more public space in our area.”
According to the group, the project, known as Under the K, would be built out in four sections: The Arm, a linear promenade that welcomes pedestrians and cyclists into the space; K-flex 1, a “multifunctional zone,” for play, community activities and programming; K-flex 2, an area for large performances including bleachers; and the Creekside, a space with seating, public outlooks, and a “restorative landscape of native creek side ecologies.” The space is defined by the concrete beams under the bridge, that go from 40- to 120-feet-high.
The space follows the construction timeline of the Kosciuszko Bridge, the Brooklyn-bound span of which is due to open in September; the section below the bridge will be finished a month after, Horowitz says.
Some aspects of the design will be finished by the end of this year, but a slate of public programming—which will include film screenings and concerts—isn’t expected to launch until next spring.
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