Rockaway boardwalk to be rebuilt this winter
City says plans will be out in Sept.
Plans for the reconstruction of the Rockaway Beach boardwalk, destroyed in Hurricane Sandy, will be out in September, Parks Commissioner Veronica White said Monday,
“We’ve hosted several meetings out in the communities in the various parts of the Rockaways to discuss what we need going forward, and what the community has made clear to us and what the mayor has made clear to me is that we rebuild the boardwalk,” White said at a press conference at Riis Landing to announce CUNY’s planned institute at Jamaica Bay. “In addition we will build some kind of protection for the communities while we do that. We will be coming back to the community with the design in September, discussing that in the fall and hoping for construction to start on the new boardwalk by the end of the year.”
Much of the boardwalk west of Beach 85th Street was washed away in Sandy and small “boardwalk islands” around concession stands were rebuilt in time for this summer.
In the meantime, the Army Corps of Engineers is moving forward with rebuilding much of the beach that was washed away in the storm, including protective dunes.
“We just started phase one, which is to repair the existing project out in the Rockaways, so the sand being pumped now is part of that project,” Col. Paul Owen, commander of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers New York District, said at Monday’s press conference.
Residents in the Rockaways have held a number of rallies demanding the boardwalk reconstruction be prioritized along with the construction of new dunes to protect the community from future storms.
Some, including Assemblyman Phil Goldfeder (D-Rockaway Park), said they would like to see jetties built along the beach west of Arverne as well. The jetties have been credited with lessening the impact of Sandy’s storm surge on the eastern half of the Rockaway Peninsula.
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