CB1 Committee Wanted Citi Bikes in Seaport, Just Not HERE

Cyclists return their CitiBikes to the new station on Peck Slip, between Water and Front Streets, where a Community Board 1 committee says the bike rack ruins the open space of the car-free plaza. Photo: Amanda Woods/Tribeca Trib

Community Board 1 had pushed for a Citi Bike station at the South Street Seaport. But when the bikes arrived on Peck Slip earlier this month, the board’s Seaport Committee was not pleased.

The 32-bike station was installed on a block-long, car-free center section of the wide street, between Front and Water streets. Now partitioned by planters and blocks of granite, the city plans to make the space part of two-block-long Peck Slip Park, due to open late next year between South and Water streets.

Until a couple of months ago, the area had been filled with construction equipment for water main work on the street. Some residents and their kids quickly came to enjoy the wide open space. Something lacking in the Seaport.

Then the bikes arrived.

“The concern I have is that it used to be open for us,” said John Fratta, chair Community Board 1's Seaport Committee.  “It’s not really an area where you can put a bike station.”

In an email, Marco Pasanella, the chair of the merchant group Old Seaport Alliance and co-chair of CB1’s Seaport Committee, expressed a similar view.

“I have worked hard to get Peck Slip cleared of rubble and accessible to our community,” he wrote. “I have also been equally supportive of a Citi Bike share in the Old Seaport. I just don’t think they should go in the same place.”

Last December, the board passed a resolution requesting a Citi Bike station for the Seaport, noting that it would “bring increased activity to the area and help revitalize the local economy” still hurting from Hurricane Sandy. They suggested South Street between Fulton Street and Peck Slip as a potential spot.

Seaport Committee member Paul Hovitz said in a phone interview that he was surprised to see that the city’s Department of Transportation did not place the racks where the board had recommended.

“There are other places to put bike racks,” Hovitz said. “There is all kinds of room under the FDR Drive. I don’t understand why they wouldn't make use of that area.”

Yet another alternate location—at the northeast corner of Peck Slip and Front Street, near the Con Edison substation—was proposed by board member Michael Kramer and became the final one favored by the committee. Its resolution will be voted on by the full board on July 29.

Pasanella called the resolution “a workable alternative, with the bike share sited near, but not in the middle of Peck Slip.”

“Our goal has been, and remains, to give our residents access to valuable outdoor space while encouraging others to come visit us,” he added.

The Department of Transportation did not respond to requests for comment.