Niagara Heritage Partnership’s Comments at the Citizens’
Advisory Committee (CAC)
April 12, 2006 Greenway Meeting
The Niagara Heritage Partnership welcomes the opportunity
to participate in the CAC process of Niagara Greenway planning. As
stakeholders in the NYPA relicensing process we were primarily concerned
with, though not limited to, NYPA impacts on that portion of the Niagara
River from Niagara Falls, NY to Lewiston, NY. We successfully moved our
request for studies regarding four-lane gorge parkway removal through
two subcommittees, but the topic did not survive in a meaningful way as
negotiations narrowed to other concerns.
When we repeatedly attempted to introduce this and other
environmental issues centered on this 6.5 mile stretch of river, we were
just as repeatedly told by NYPA negotiators that these topics were too
“project specific,” that they intended to discuss broader concepts, that
the topics would be discussed at some later date, etc., responses that
we finally came to see as evasive negotiation tactics.
When the Niagara River Greenway Commission was created
by Gov. Pataki, NYPA negotiators immediately shifted their stance
regarding our issues and we were then told the proper venue for voicing
our concerns would be the Greenway Commission. Although citizen
stakeholders seem even more marginalized by the commission structure
than they had been during relicensing talks, we nevertheless bring our
concerns to the commission, trusting its objectivity will require that
it request Wendall Duchscherer to formulate at least one gorge greenway
plan without parkway lanes. The rationale and broad organizational,
international, and citizen support of this proposal validates this
option, as well as its strong correspondence with the Conservation
Funds’ American Greenways Program and book, Greenways A Guide to
Planning, Design and Development.
Additional initiatives we are advocating the commission
take under advisement for incorporation into the Niagara Greenway plan
are as follows:
• The creation of an ecology center dealing with
regional flora and fauna, with entertainment, tourist, as well as
educational, research, preservation and restoration potential as
proposed by stakeholders other than the Niagara Heritage Partnership
during relicensing. We suggest the historic building at Deveaux State
Park as a possible location.
• That funding be allocated to the establishment of a
Joint International Biological Commission as proposed by P.M. Eckel
(July, 2004) and that some aspect of this commission be housed and
supported by the previously mentioned ecological center. See
accompanying document.
• The potential for creating a greenhouse over the
NYPA generating plant parkway lanes, for the propagation of native flora
to be used in restoration projects and for other benefits as discussed
elsewhere.
• Evaluation of reduced homeland security risks with vehicle parkway
lanes over the generating plant closed to traffic, as discussed
elsewhere.
• The potential for an external elevator on the Wrobel
Towers, Niagara Falls, NY (public/private enterprise) to carry residents
and visitors to a rooftop observation deck.
• The restoration of Devil’s Hole State Park by
bridging the damage caused by the NYPA access road, the restoration of
historic CCC railings, the removal of rock debris in the gorge caused by
road construction, currently a botanical dead zone, as discussed
elsewhere, photographs included.
• Since Hyde Park Landfill is listed as “remediated,”
the restoration of the underground water flow (from the currently
plugged Bloody Run remnants) to Devil’s Hole for maintenance/restoration
of botanical communities dependent on water seepage.
• The removal of the OSPRHP maintenance garage facilities currently
operated on the gorge edge to a more suitable location away from the
greenway corridor and the natural restoration of that area.
While creating a Niagara River Greenway has the potential
to be a very positive asset to our region, we remind ourselves that its
creation is an extension of the NYPA
relicensing process and, therefore, the Commissioners are functioning on
behalf of NYPA representatives as well as representing their own
interests and those of the region, with all of the attending inherent
conflicts and responsibilities. In any case, the damage caused to the
natural landscapes by the construction and continued operation of the
NYPA generating plant in the lower gorge and its negative visual impact
(we don’t accept, NYPA claims that “the concrete makeup of the plant
walls blends well with the limestone of the gorge”) and the four lane
Robert Moses gorge parkway, especially at Devils’ Hole, and NYPA’s
destruction of the historic Milk Cave, Gorge Cave, and the alteration of
Fish Creek in support of this highway provide in large part the
rationale for most of the aforementioned reparation requests be
addressed by the Niagara Greenway Plan.
Attachments Included: