Subject:     Expand the Audubon Park Historic District

​

 

Hon. Sarah Carroll

Chair, New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission

 

Hon. Bill de Blasio

Mayor of the City of New York

 

Subject: Expand the Audubon Park Historic District 

 

Dear Commissioner Carroll and Mayor de Blasio,

 

The time has come to realize Community Board 12’s 2009 vision for an Audubon Park Historic District that stretches along Riverside Drive and its tributaries from 155th to 162nd Streets. This plan would expand the current historic district architecturally, historically, and culturally, by adding the oldest continuously occupied wooden structure in northern Manhattan, three sets of row houses pre-dating and anticipating rapid transit, and apartment houses representing later periods and architects than those in the currently designated area.

 

Additionally, extending the historic district to include the row houses on West 158th Street, the Mitchell-Lama apartment building at 156-20 Riverside Drive West, and all of the buildings lining Riverside Drive between 158th and 162nd Streets, would recognize the area’s cultural and historical significance in the fight for racial justice and equality by preserving

 

• 857 Riverside Drive, a house associated with an Abolitionist community active in northern Manhattan in the mid-nineteenth century

• A row of houses on West 158th Street that African-American families reclaimed and preserved in the 1960s and ‘70s, and

• The River Terrace Mitchell-Lama building that has provided affordable co-ops to middle income people since the 1960s and which fostered neighborhood integration. The River Terrace was the home of David Dinkins, New York City’s first and Black mayor, Robert Lowery, New York’s first Black Fire Commissioner, and many celebrated activists, artists, and musicians.

 

In keeping with the Landmark Preservation Commission’s recently published “Equity Framework” that aims to prioritize “designations that represent New York City’s diversity and designations in areas less represented by landmarks,” and to redress the imbalance in landmark designation in New York City, Commissioner Carroll, we ask you to prioritize and calendar the Upper Riverside Residents Alliance’s Request for Evaluation without delay. Mr. Mayor, we ask you to ensure that all relevant City resources are mobilized to help this effort succeed.

 

Thank you for your consideration and swift response.

​

[YOUR NAME AND ADDRESS]