Stop Artificial Turf
in East River Park and across the city
The “Touch Grass” bill to BAN artificial turf in New York City Parks has been introduced by our City Council Member Christopher Marte. Please support this important environmental and health legislation.
This is something we’ve been agitating for. With the rebuilding of the decimated East River Park, we need as much real greenery as we can get, not plastic grass fields that endanger health, especially of children.
Click here to see what’s so unhealthy about synthetic turf.
THEN
Contact City Council Member Christopher Marte‘s office to add your voice of support. His Lower Manhattan district includes the Lower East Side, Chinatown, Downtown and some of East River Park. Call 212-587-3159 and/or write to support this effort and for increased funding for parks. district1@council.nyc.gov
Also contact City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams to urge her to hold a hearing on the bill, which is the next step in moving along the passage. Urge her to co-sponsor the bill, too: SpeakerAdams@council.nyc.gov, 212-482-6731 or 718-206-2068.
If you are in another City Council District, do contact your representative to ask them to co-sponsor and support this “Touch Grass” bill and to support increased funding for Parks (real grass takes more maintenance than synthetic grass, but costs less in the long run). Tell them to think of the future. Here’s a link where you can enter your address to locate your city, state and federal elected officials: https://www.mygovnyc.org
And in New York State
Great news from our Real Grass friend Massimo Strino of saveinwoodpark.org:
Senator Robert Jackson is introducing senate bill S6868 that prohibits the installation or replacement of synthetic turf at outdoor athletic fields and facilities owned or operated by municipalities or school districts in the state. This is a great and important move towards removing plastic from our playing fields, and preventing the introduction of more microplastic in our environment. As you may already know, microplastic is entering not only our environment, but it is being found in our bodies, in our brains and lungs, and it has been proved to cross the placental barrier, so newborn children are already polluted by it at birth!
Please, go to the New York State Senate page https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/bills/2025/S6868 to show your support for this bill, it takes only 1 minute. After you register and vote “AYE” the page will refresh and you will receive a confirmation email.
Assembly member Grace Lee (East River Park’s district) introduced a bill last year for a moratorium on artificial turf throughout the state until the effects can be studied. They banned it in Boston! We can too.
Please contact Lee (and if you are in another district, your own assembly member as well) (https://www.mygovnyc.org to look up your districts.)
Ask Lee to update* and push hard for this legislation: Call 212-312-1420. Email leeg@nyassembly.gov
Bill #A07158.
*The update that is needed–the current bill focuses on crumb rubber infill (the little pebbles that keep the plastic grass blades upright). The city no longer uses it–but other infills have other dangers (see links below), and synthetic turf overall has many risks (excessive heat, player injuries, forever chemicals and plastics entering our soil, air, water and lungs). The moratorium called for in the bill should be in place to study the hazards of artificial turf overall. Ask for a complete ban.
What are the risks to mention? See the links below for the many hazards:
Fact Sheet Overview
Deep dive into the research about Artificial Turf
Our own alarming experience on the Lower East Side
Save (What’s Left of)East River Park
Ask the City WTF (read on to learn specific, polite ways of saying it) via the East Side Coastal Resiliency overseer, the Department of Design and Construction (DDC). Their inquiry form is here.
Other possible changes to current ESCR plan
The design has already been revised over and over by the Department of Design and Construction, which is overseeing the ESCR. It can be revised further with our ideas—finding ways to preserve the northern end of the park with more than 500 trees that hasn’t yet been razed.
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Photo archives
You can look at East River Park photos and also upload your own to this Flickr (photo sharing site) group, East River Park, New York City https://flic.kr/g/3fN7Kd
We also have a biodiversity photo archive at iNaturalist:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=132141&subview=map
You can click on “filters” to select “Research Grade” (more reliable identifications), categories (birds, insects, plants, etc.), or add date or month restrictions. I use this all the time!
There is also a bird list on e-Bird: https://ebird.org/hotspot/L872559
Some of these are linked to photos.
A slide show of the wonders of East River Park in recent years and what we are losing by Pat Arnow. https://patarnow.zenfolio.com/p313418955
2001-2011 a slide show of the painful 10-year closure of the waterfront promenade. Rebuilding was promised as a two year project starting in 2005 (before that, starting July, 2001, the waterfront was just flat closed with no plans to fix the builkheads) by Pat Arnow: https://patarnow.zenfolio.com/p249576553
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More Air Quality
To get involved in LES Breathe, the East River Park Action effort to monitor and improve air quality during this project, contact LESbreathe@gmail.com
LES Breathe
Thanks to your support, LES Breathe has purchased air quality sensors. The first five PurpleAir real time monitors are being placed around the neighborhood, along with mobile sensors that work indoors or out. In coming weeks, these sensors will provide open data that will be shared on easy to use maps.
Also in the works:
- A guide in Spanish and English for having cleaner air at home
- An inclusive Air Quality engagement campaign
- A concise review of the 2,000 page report on the Park’s soil and water. That was another document that came to East River Park Action via a Freedom of Information Law (FOIL).
LES Breathe has a growing number of volunteers – contact lesbreathe@gmail.com to get involved.
For more about this public health-focused committee of East River Park Action, visit our LES Breathe web page.
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Please donate–we are a 501(c)3 so donations are tax deductible.
Donate via PayPal (you can use a credit card with this link also). Or write checks payable to “East River Park Action” then, in the memo write “legal.” Send to East River Park Action, c/o Jonathan Lefkowitz, 426 E. 10th St., New York, N.Y. 10009