Gowanus Canal

New York City's Gowanus Canal has been heavily polluted for years. Mayor Bloomberg said the cleanup would happen, but it never did. Now the EPA is calling the troubled waterway a Superfund site and the city is kickstarting action.

The EPA's proposal to list the Gowanus Canal as a Superfund site is getting mixed reactions from nearby residents and officials: some see the designation as a development-halting stigma, others as quite the opposite.