Millions of dollars of taxpayer money Spent About the new park and dog run in Queens. Now all that's left is for residents to use it.
Maspeth Park, built with $17.8 million in state funds, has been a virtual ghost town since it opened last year under the Kosciuszko Bridge.
Local residents told The Washington Post that the store is located in a segregated industrial and manufacturing area at the intersection of 54th Street and 43rd Avenue, more than a mile from the nearest subway station, and lacks proper signage or lighting to help passersby find it.
“Nobody knows about this. I'm the only one here, all the time,” said Elvis Mazzotta, 36, one of three people there on a sunny Tuesday afternoon last month.
Although it's not the easiest to get to, Mazzotta goes there about once a week and calls it “one of the best parks in the city for exercise.”
He said public parking isn't readily available during the week, forcing people to drive to the site and park on the sidewalk.
Karen Narvaez, who has lived in Sunnyside for 12 years with her husband and three young children, said she and her family live less than a half mile from the park, but her children can't walk to the park because the highway crosses the neighborhood.
“How do you get there? It's not safe for kids to walk to get to the skate park,” said Narvaez, 38.
park faced similar criticism It was provided by the local Juniper Park Civic Association when the site opened last year.
While Gov. Kathy Hawkle asserted in a press release that the new park would be “within walking distance of the surrounding residential neighborhoods, including Sunnyside and West Maspeth,” the civic group argued that exploring the industrial area firsthand “is quite an adventure no matter which direction you look at it.”
“It needs to be better promoted,” acknowledged Thomas Mitsaz, secretary of the Blissville Civic Association near Long Island City.
“We can do more. … We need to improve the 43rd Street underpass and make it more accessible to people. [with] “It has better lighting and better access,” he said.
While this park doesn't have much green space, it does feature a basketball court, exercise equipment, game tables, and even professional sports lighting for nighttime recreation.
While some local residents lament that they've waited decades for a park only to find it's mostly concrete, Mitsaz said it's a great addition to the area.
“Whatever we call it, we're going to create a park,” he said. “To me it's pure joy.”
Blissville is “one of the safest areas” for children to walk, Mitsaz said, and on a good weekend the park sees 20 to 30 people.
One of the park's most popular spots is the concrete skateboard park, which attracts around half a dozen skaters on any given weekday evening, according to a skateboarder who declined to give his name.
The 27-year-old skater said the lack of public transport doesn't bother him because the park is located near popular street spots for skating and filming.
Meanwhile, just a mile or so from Maspeth Park, the L/CPL Thomas P. Noonan Jr. Playground in Sunnyside saw the grand opening of a $2.5 million dog run last month.
But the park has faced access issues for years, local families told The Post.
Residents say their biggest concern is a group of homeless men who live on the property, shower in the children's splash pad, trash the toilets and pass out naked and high in the toddler play area.
Maria, 43, said a group of homeless men moved into the children's play area after the dog park they once used to sleep in was renovated.
Park officials told The Washington Post that the six men were “using toilets throughout the park” and that their unclean practices had led park officials to close the women's restrooms.
Locals say illegal gatherings have swelled to as many as 25 people on weekends, with men fighting, doing drugs around younger residents and littering the park with crack pipes and needles.
“It's a terrible situation,” said Sunnyside resident Christian Humala, 39. “Even when we have kids, they always shower with the sprinklers on.”
Alyssa, 35, who lives a block away from the park, said she no longer goes to the park unless she's with her husband because the homeless situation there has gotten worse since the pandemic.
Anna, a 42-year-old babysitter who goes to the park every day, said she witnessed the man pull out a large knife in broad daylight during an argument over a woman.
“All the kids were here,” she said.
City Council Member Julie Wong, whose jurisdiction includes both Maspeth Park and Noonan Playground, told The Washington Post that people sleeping in parks is a “pervasive problem citywide and not limited to Noonan Playground.”
“Our city is facing an affordable housing crisis,” Wong said in a statement.
She added that they are currently working to identify and accommodate suggestions from local residents for additional park space.
