E-BULLETIN OF THE HISTORIC DISTRICTS COUNCIL
May 2013, Volume 10, Number 2
Help Save the New York Public Library from Itself
Rally & Leafleting on Wednesday, May 8, 3:30pm – 5:30pm
RAIN or SHINE
The late Ada Louise Huxtable called it “a plan devised out of a profound ignorance of or willful disregard for not only the library’s original concept and design, but also the folly of altering its meaning and mission and compromising its historical and architectural integrity. You don’t ‘update’ a masterpiece” (Wall Street Journal)
The Central Library Plan (CLP) threatens to demolish the historic book stacks and install a new circulating library at the New York Public Library, one of the world’s great reference libraries and a New York City Individual Landmark designed by architects Carrère and Hastings in 1911.
The Plan will:
- Cost $350 million (probably more), of which $150 million will come from New York City taxpayers.
- Threaten the 42nd Street Library’s status as one of the world’s great research libraries.
- Endanger the architectural integrity of the landmarked 42nd Street building.
AND
- It was conceived in a closed door process, with minimal public notification and zero public input.
The Committee to Save the NYPL calls for a halt to the CLP until an independent agency can conduct a detailed cost analysis.
Michael Kimmelman states in his scathing New York Times review of the CLP on January 29, 2013, “A new Mid-Manhattan branch should cost a fraction of gutting the stacks and could produce much better architecture.”
Take action by joining the Committee to Save the NYPL in a public rally on Wednesday, May 8th at 3:30PM sharp in front of the NYPL facing Fifth Avenue, during the meeting of the NYPL Trustees.
For more information, see www.savenypl.org. To subscribe to the Committee’s newsletter, click here.
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Rally for the World’s Fair Grounds!
Thursday the 9th at 12 noon!
Flushing Meadows Corona Park, designed for the 1939 and 1964 World’s Fairs, is threatened by the development of yet another stadium. The city plans to lease 13 acres of the park for $1 per year to Sheik Mansour bin Zayed al-Nahyan for a Major League Soccer stadium. This is in addition to plans for the expansion of the National Tennis Center and the construction of a shopping center on the site of the former Shea Stadium, all part of the unfortunate trend that includes selling off schools, libraries, and even public housing land to private developers. Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the area eyed for the stadium (the remains of the 1964 Pool of Industry) “isn’t very much and isn’t in good shape,” but a visit on the weekend proves that, despite willful neglect by the city, it is a lively piece of a very popular park. The Flushing Meadows Corona Park which has provided New Yorkers and visitors alike countless happy memories deserves our respect and protection.
Please join HDC and The Fairness Coalition of Queens on Thursday for a press conference and rally to stop the Bloomberg administration from giving away our parkland.
What: rally and press conference
When: Thursday, May 9 at 12 noon
Where: United Arab Emirates Embassy – 305 East 47th Street, New York, N.Y. 10017
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