Renovated Washington Market Park Reopens, Tribeca Rejoices!

Shout it loud and proud, New Yorkers, Washington Market Park is back!

That’s the esctatic exclamation of Tribecans and visitors alike who went nearly the entire summer without the sacred greenspace, which closed on June 3 for renovation. Though it reopened improbably fast, on Aug. 27, a star-studded ribbon cutting for this accomplishment took place on the warm, sunny Saturday morning of Sept. 20.

Named for the sprawling municipal produce market that operated nearby from the 19th century to the mid-1950s, Washington Market Park, which is bound by Chambers and Duane streets south to north; and Greenwich and West streets east to west, first opened in 1983.

Since then, its value to the Tribeca community can’t be overstated, especially for the students and families of PS 134 just across Chambers Street. The Borough of Manhattan Community College is also adjacent, and accessible by stairs near the park’s northwest section, where there are clean restrooms and a butterfly garden.

Over the years, the park has evolved with the neighborhood and been upgraded, but there’s always something to improve. The big issue this time was drainage, both on the park’s paths and its genuine dirt and grass field. After heavy rains, one could almost have gone off-road mud bogging here, though it might have been a tight squeeze for some of the trucks to get inside. Thankfully, few mud boggers realized this and the park remained merely muddy.

With the diligent advocacy of the Friends of Washington Market Park, the drainage and other issues were raised to both the NYC Parks Department and Council Member Christopher Marte.

The parks-loving Council member, in turn, was able to allocate $200,000 for the work in fiscal year 2024, with an equal amount budgeted for additional upgrades, including to the crucially important children’s play equipment.

While it would seem axiomatic that all politicians love parks—and on the surface, at least, that’s probably true—their individual ability to respond to parks’ issues, with attention, money where needed, and an eye toward project management varies widely.

For those who have seen other park renovations stretch on months and even years beyond schedule, or never get done at all, the fact that Washington Market Park was closed for only three months is little short of astounding.

There are some things the park has in its favor.

First, the work wasn’t that complicated—it’s just mud, man!— though anything involving water and drainage is a potential nightmare; Red Hook Track in Brooklyn, for example, has been closed for four full years because of a drainage-pipe issue that turned maddeningly complex and slow to rectify.

Second, the Friends of Washington Market Park, the nonprofit that helps manage and organize park events (which are always free), is exceptionally organized, and affable. A visit to their well-designed, informative website alone will have many parks aficionados offering their well-wishes, money, and time—which is a good thing.

While perhaps not replicable in poorer neighborhoods where civic engagement is more diffuse, or parks that have in part been allowed to become de facto homeless shelters and open-air drug markets (looking at you, Washington Square), what the Friends and the NYC Parks Department have achieved here is remarkable.

And so, even a few weeks after its reopening, a formal ribbon cutting was in order.

With the farmers market bustling outside on Greenwich Street and a kids’ birthday party already underway inside, the celebrants made their way to the park’s iconic gazebo, itself the beneficiary of a recent, privately funded makeover.

Leading the event as emcee was effervescent Manhattan Borough Parks Commissioner Tricia Shimamura. With a small and mostly working public address system to amplify their voices above the morning hubbub, Shimamura and others spoke eloquently about the importance of the park generally and the specific issues that were addressed during its closure.

Besides the drainage and gazebo, this included installing all new benches and addressing some maintenance concerns in the kids’ playground.

Besides Shimamura, addressing the gathered dozens were Christopher Marte, State Senator Brian Kavanagh, myriad Friends of Washington Market Park, and a slightly late but still excited Congressman Dan Goldman, who is notably more relaxed in person than he sometimes appears in more overtly political settings.

Representing the Fourth Estate was the legendary Tribeca Trib editor and photographer Carl Glassman, trim and fit with a shock of white hair belying the polite but assertive lengths he’ll go to to get the shot he wants. “Excuse me, could you please move to the left?” he asked a rival reporter. Surely!