by | Sep 26, 2023 12:01 pm | Comments (17)
Thomas Breen photo
A newly installed 988 sign on the Ferry Street Bridge.
Three hopeful numbers will be posted atop East Rock Park, in a sign urging those who are considering harming themselves to reach out to a new national suicide-prevention hotline instead.
by | Sep 21, 2023 4:08 pm | Comments (132)
Thomas Breen photo
At Wednesday's parks commission meeting: this crew doesn't have power over summit road.
The Elicker administration — and not the parks commission — will have the final say over whether or not the road to the top of East Rock Park remains largely closed to cars, and open to pedestrians and cyclists only.
The mayor said he has received widespread community support for keeping the road largely closed to cars, so he plans not to make a change.
Continue reading ‘Mayor: I'm Keeping Park Road Mostly Car-Closed’
by | Sep 21, 2023 1:21 pm | Comments (20)
Thomas Breen photo
Acting Director Rebecca Bombero: Consultant-led process "could lead to a reconfiguration" of parks-public works.
The Elicker administration is moving towards a potential un-merging of the parks and public works departments — or an entirely different parks-service setup altogether — by seeking a consultant to host community conversations around how City Hall should tend its public greenspaces.
Continue reading ‘City Steps Towards Parks Department Re-Redo’
by | Aug 21, 2023 12:17 pm | Comments (7)
Aaron Goode, Jean Webb, Marty Lendroth take on the jungle in the Heights.
It’s technically Ailanthus Altissima, or colloquially Tree of Heaven, but in Fair Haven Heights’ Fairmont Park it’s more often called, with a grrrrrrrr, as gardeners labor to uproot it, the Tree of Hell. Or from Hell.
But there’s now a lot less of this quick rising (thus toward heaven?) invasive Chinese species, and that’s thanks to decades of effort by Sylvia Dorsey and her stalwart crew of Friends of Fairmont Park.
Continue reading ‘Fairmont Park Gardeners Send Trees Of Heaven Straight To ...’
by | Aug 14, 2023 12:14 pm | Comments (2)
Allan Appel photo
Friends of Kensington Park's Olivia Marston, Myles Branch and his sketch of future equipment.
How about an upgraded splash pad — one where there’s not only refreshing spray, but the really cool kind where buckets of water fall on your head?
Continue reading ‘Pizza & Playground Plans Prevail At Kensington Park’
by | Jul 20, 2023 3:03 pm | Comments (93)
Thomas Breen Photo
After a months-long debate and impasse over whether to fully reopen the road up to the summit of East Rock Park, the Board of Park Commissioners may have stumbled upon a solution: a magic bus.
Continue reading ‘Bus Fix Floated For East Rock Park Impasse’
by | Jul 5, 2023 12:18 pm | Comments (4)
Allan Appel photos
Pablo Sumba, marveling at the mouth of a freshly caught porgy ...
... at Lighthouse Point Park on the day before July 4th.
Pablo Sumba and his family left their land-locked home in Waterbury early in the morning to fit in as many waterfront activities as they could during a pre-holiday trip to Lighthouse Point Park — including fishing, swimming, grilling (some of the 12 porgies they caught), and just hanging out with five-month-old baby Lucas, who lay on a blanket on the green grass nearby.
Continue reading ‘Catching Porgies With Pablo At Lighthouse Point’
by | Jul 3, 2023 11:14 am | Comments (3)
Asher Joseph photos
Ranezmay (right) and her friends delight in the spouts of water on the splash pad ...
... as volunteers prepare to mulch a nearby patch of dirt.
The sound of rustling leaves merged with squeals of joy and the gurgling of the Kensington Playground splash pad as a light mist wafted through the heavy heat. Despite the stifling smog that hung in the air, neither the Friends of Kensington Playground clean-up volunteers nor the neighborhood’s kids let it deter them from rejoicing in the beauty of a recently saved public park.
Continue reading ‘Splashing & Mulching At Kensington Playground With Ranezmay, Pat, Jane, & Friends’
by | Jun 26, 2023 4:59 pm | Comments (1)
Asher Joseph photo
Sierra Welch, a participant of New Haven's Youth @ Work program, with her handy clippers.
Stalks snapped as tie-dye-clad Sierra Welch hunched over a cluster of Japanese knotweeds, wrenching the invasive plant out of the ground off a beaten path in Edgewood Park on Monday afternoon.
Continue reading ‘Believe-It-Or-Knotweed In Edgewood Park With Sierra’
by | Jun 26, 2023 12:14 pm | Comments (1)
Kian Ahmadi photos
Annemarie Rivera-Berrios stands by the playscape with her rake and shovel
Chris Ozyck and Mike Simons add new mulch to the playground
It took just under half an hour for AnneMarie Rivera-Berrios and a small group of friends to level the mound of mulch that had been sitting by the swing sets at Peat Meadow Park for three months — to make sure that kids have a softer ground to land on the next time they come out to enjoy the Annex public playground.
Continue reading ‘Sprucing Up Peat Meadow Park With AnneMarie’
by | Jun 22, 2023 1:06 pm | Comments (90)
Thomas Breen File Photo
The road to the top of East Rock: Let cars roll, again?
Parks commissioners delayed deciding on whether or not to fully reopen the road to the top of East Rock Park to cars — as they weighed the testimony of drivers and those who struggle to walk such a long steep slope alongside that of frequent pedestrians and clean-park proponents.
by | Jun 21, 2023 10:20 am | Comments (3)
Contributed photo
Mayor Elicker (center) at "summer fun" presser at Lighthouse Park.
Summer has officially begun — and New Haven is ready for it, with movies in the park and free basketball lessons and open swims and summer-slump-combatting reading challenges on tap.
by and | Jun 19, 2023 4:22 pm | Comments (1)
Kian Ahmadi photo
Jermaine Galberth at Scantlebury Park's splash pad on Monday.
As two-year-old Jermaine Galberth, Jr. pushed his little sister Jasmine’s stroller through the Scantlebury Park splash pad, proud dad Jermaine, Sr. watched his children at play — and remembered when he was a kid and there was little more than sewer water in a place now teeming with much healthier opportunities for cooling off.
by | Jun 15, 2023 2:57 pm | Comments (33)
Thomas Breen photo
Kishaun Jenkins: Celebrating "the coolest spot to be."
A Boston-based affordable housing developer has dropped its plans to buy a Kensington Street public park and construct 15 new apartments in its stead — prompting the Elicker administration to move to end a related years-long lawsuit on the grounds that the contested public greenspace will remain public and green.
by | Jun 15, 2023 1:54 pm | Comments (4)
Paul Bass
Carmen Pajarillo took a break from studying for a medical board exam Thursday morning by bringing her dog Honey to a hidden pocket of paradise.
Continue reading ‘The Word On Jefferson Street: An Urban Oasis Beckons’
by | Jun 13, 2023 12:43 pm | Comments (2)
Abiba Biao photos
On the newly renovated and painted Goffe Street Park courts.
"Super" John Williamson's daughters Shareebah, Kali, and Raushana Williamson: Keeping dad's legacy alive.
Michael Evans-Benton watched as a trio of teenagers shot hoops on the newly renovated basketball courts at Goffe Street Park — and found himself captivated not just by the game before him, but also by the bright red and green colors and swirling eye design beneath the players’ feet.
by | Jun 12, 2023 2:55 pm | Comments (12)
Paul Bass Photo
Josh Philie finishing up one of the new Coogan murals.
The city’s youth and recreation department handed cans to graffiti artists to spray away on the walls of Coogan Pavilion and Edgewood skate park — in the hope of retaining a family-friendly feeling for the summer.
by | May 31, 2023 6:09 pm | Comments (22)
Zoom images
Clockwise from top left: Mayoral candidates Shafiq Abdussabur, Liam Brennan, Wendy Hamilton, and Tom Goldenberg at Tuesday's debate.
A network of green spaces linking every public park in New Haven. A larger role for people of color and women in building the city’s physical landscape. A pedestrian walkway connecting Union Station to Downtown. A ban on new parking lots and garages in favor of playgrounds.
Continue reading ‘Debate Pitch: Here's How I'd Fix The Parks’
by | May 25, 2023 12:10 pm | Comments (8)
Nora Grace-Flood and Austin Traver photos
Walter Pop Smith little leaguers play ball!
Coach Wayne Morrison to City: Please level the playing field.
City Little Leaguers pitched, slid, struck out and hit homers at the Munson Street baseball fields on which generations of baby baseball players have practiced for nearly 70 years — while attentive parents and coaches fretted about how the skewed state of those playing grounds could stymie their kids’ games and self-esteem.
by | Apr 28, 2023 4:43 pm | Comments (41)
City of New Haven rendering
A sketch of the proposed new Long Wharf Drive park.
City and state officials imagined a not-too-distant future when New Haven residents and visitors alike can comfortably walk along, eat by, play at, and enjoy a rebuilt and amenity-rich waterfront park, as they celebrated a recent $12.1 million windfall for Long Wharf’s coming transformation.
Continue reading ‘$12M State Grant Celebrated For Long Wharf Park's Renewal’
by | Apr 28, 2023 8:42 am | Comments (18)
Paul Bass Photo
De Anda: Regeneration nation.
Joshua De Anda knelt to pull weeds amid a forest of oak trees — that towered, for now, barely above his knees.
In the process he has been helping his city and his country figure out how to enable the “king of trees” to thrive again and truly tower in its indigenous habitats.
by | Apr 24, 2023 8:41 am | Comments (2)
Allan Appel photo
Team Popcorn Colonel leader Ariel Unger with designer ball and gifts of floss.
The tension was mounting (well, sort of) late Saturday afternoon at East Rock Park: Team Popcorn Colonel — dressed in matching Orville Redenbacher outfits, complete with red suspenders and bow ties — were busy jumping on a trampoline while trying to sink a beachball-size papier-mâché popcorn kernel into a bucket.
Nearby across a blanket strewn with bike look-alike food (Cheetos and toothpicks in the shape of a two-wheeler?), Team Bicycle were forming themselves into a human velocipede.
Continue reading ‘Who Needs Burning Man? We Have Competitive Picnicking’
by | Apr 21, 2023 1:13 pm | Comments (15)
Thomas Breen photos
Lifetime parks commission members Carl Babb, David Belowsky ...
... and Hector Torres.
David Belowsky, Carl Babb, and Hector Torres haven’t yet figured out the secret to living forever.
If they do find that key to immortality, they’d likely be able to stay on the parks commission for just as long — even if the city does wind up dropping the board’s longstanding, and mysterious, lifetime appointments.
Continue reading ‘Immortality Loophole Looms For Board Lifers’
by | Apr 21, 2023 9:05 am | Comments (9)
Yaakov Gottlieb file photo
Pop Smith All-Star Jayshawn pitches on Bowen Field in 2020.
The dugouts at Bowen Field need to be extended to let baseball teams sit together.
The Green needs more trash cans — with lids — to handle overflowing waste.
A woodsy park on Russell Street needs to be surveyed to resolve a tree-cutting dispute.
And an East Shore ex-skating rink needs to be renovated into a community center — which will be renamed in part to honor a Morris Cove teen who, before his sudden death last year, spent much of his young life playing with friends in the park.
by | Apr 19, 2023 2:50 pm | Comments (2)
Thomas Breen photo
Outdoor fitness equipment slated for Wooster Memorial Park.
Wooster Street parkgoers should soon have a new climbing structure, pull up bars, and other outdoor fitness equipment to help them exercise in the public greenspace, thanks to a donation from the Dalio Foundation.