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Where Coney island began
CIHP Director Charles Denson frees a snagged horseshoe crab. The bridge site before and after CIHP clean-up.
CIHP restores creek shoreline, rescues snagged horseshoe crabs
The Citizens Water Quality Testing Program has recently recorded unacceptable levels of pollution at all of the test sites on Coney Island Creek. This means that there may be many more illegal sewage hookups to the creek's storm sewers. The high readings could also be related to the massive infrastructure construction going on in Coney Island. The levels fluctuate, but are still showing some of the highest readings in the entire city.
What is Coney Island Creek?
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coney creek pollution Levels are spiking higher!
Coney Island History Project staff recently noticed that spawning horseshoe crabs had moved further up the creek than ever before and were getting snagged and trapped at the illegal dump site below the Cropsey Avenue bridge. In June two History Project volunteers climbed down ladders and began freeing crabs that had become trapped by ropes, tires, and other debris. We removed snags, concrete, and tires from the site and restored it to a more natural state. CIHP plans to monitor the site and continue clean-ups in the future.
Learn the fascinating history of the creek!
Tell NYSDEC: NYC’s Waters Remain Impaired by Sewage and Need Further Protection
The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC) proposes to remove a number of NYC waterways from the state’s “List of Impaired Waters,” sometimes referred to as the “Clean Water Act Section 303(d) List.” It is important that SWIM members oppose these delistings and keep pressure on the City and State agencies to bring NYC’s waters into compliance with water quality standards.
Help protect NYC’s waters by demanding they be listed as impaired and in need of a “Total Maximum Daily Load.” Please submit comments by August 6, 2018 to:
Sarah Rickard
NYS DEC - Division of Water
Bureau of Watershed Assessment and Management
625 Broadway
Albany, NY 12233
4pwlinfo@gw.dec.state.ny.us
THE four PUBLIC PARKS On CONEY ISLAND CREEK
Coney Island Creek Exhibit Opens at the Coney Island History Project
The Coney Island History Project's special exhibition for the 2018 season, opening on Memorial Day Weekend, is "Coney Island Creek and the Natural World." Coney Island is best known for its magnificent artifice, a manufactured reality and fantasy world that replaced the vibrant natural environment of sand dunes and salt marshes that existed before development began 200 years ago.
Very little of that environment has survived. The towering sand dunes were flattened, and the wetlands were filled in for development leaving the island vulnerable to storms. Even the island's world-famous beach is artificial, created. . . .
Coney Island Creek is the last remnant of a vast and vibrant salt marsh estuary that once covered nearly 3,000 acres between the sand dunes of Coney Island and the glacial plain of what is now Southern Brooklyn. The waterway became Coney Island’s earliest attraction as the island’s first hotels sprang up along the creek’s shoreline during the 1820s. Until the late 19th century, pristine Coney Island Creek remained a popular destination for boating, fishing, crabbing, and hunting waterfowl.
The sprawling resorts that opened along the oceanfront in the 1870s began using the creek to dispose of raw sewage, initiating of a pattern of abuse that continued for the next century. As Coney Island developed and grew into the “World’s Playground,” the surrounding marshes were filled in with garbage and ash, polluting the creek and transforming it into a two-mile long industrial waterway that still drains Southern Brooklyn through numerous storm sewer systems. For several decades, the neglected and toxic creek survived misguided attempts to destroy it by filling it in rather than restoring it.
The Clean Water Act of 1972 and a new ecological awareness changed public perception and gave new life to Coney’s neglected waterway. The 100,000 residents who live in close proximity to Coney Island Creek are coming to realize that the creek can be an asset instead of a liability. It’s now a case for Environmental Justice. Today the creek has four parks along its shoreline and is once again being used for recreation, fishing, and boating. But much work remains to be done in restoring and protecting this dynamic ecosystem. This work will require a collaborative effort and public participation is needed and appreciated. See the News section for upcoming events.
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action alert: Coney Island Creek to be removed from state list of Impaired Waterways
Coney Island Creek