City's Largest State Park Will Open In Brooklyn Next Summer

EAST NEW YORK, BROOKLYN — Two enormous landfills on the East New York waterfront will become New York City's largest state park, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced Wednesday.

The 407-acre Shirley Chisholm State Park on the shores of Jamaica Bay will open to the public next summer, according to the governor.

"This property has sat here for years, nothing happened with it," Cuomo said at a press conference Wednesday morning. "We had a vision, we had an idea, and we made it happen."

Shirley Chisholm State Park, named after the Brooklyn woman who became the United State's first African-American congresswoman, will include 10 miles of trails, 3.5 miles of waterfront were park-goers can kayak and fish, picnic areas and concessions, Cuomo said.

State officials plan to have the park open full time by summer of 2019.

New York State signed preliminary agreements with National Park Service and are hoping to unveil Phase One of the project — which cost $15 million — earlier this year.

The two land parcels about to be refurbished were once the Pennsylvania Avenue Landfill and Fountain Avenue Landfill, which were both given to the National Park Service in 1974.

The sites underwent a $235 million remediation in 2002, during which the city's Department of Environmental Protection capped the landfills, topped them with 1.2 million cubic yards of soil and planted more than 35,000 trees and prairie grass.

The landfills are now home to a new ecosystem with coastal meadows, wetlands, woodlands and local wildlife.

When the park opens in 2019, it will be the first time the public will have access to the land in the city's history.

Photos and renderings courtesy of the New York State Parks Department