Manhattan Waterfront Parking Lot to Become Public Park

A paved lot next to the East River in Manhattan will become a public park after serving as a parking lot for the NYU Langone hospital for decades. As Kevin Duggan explains in Streetsblog NYC, the hospital’s parking lease ended in 2023.

The Economic Development Corporation, the lot’s manager, announced plans to develop the 11,000-square-foot lot into a public facility with fitness equipment that will connect to the existing riverfront promenade.

The plot sits at the eastern terminus of 34th Street, offering waterfront views in an area with few waterfront amenities. “EDC President and Chief Executive Officer Andrew Kimball admitted that the reconfiguration of the space is technically ‘temporary’ because ‘there is going to be a lot of work happening around here, really, for the next couple of decades.’” Local Community Board members have been calling on EDC to also repurpose another parking lot under FDR Drive to create more public and green space under the elevated highway.