The history of the 520-acre Hudson riverfront property Quarry Waters – previously known as Kingston Landing, the AVR site and the Tilcon site – just got a little longer: On July 30, governor Andrew Cuomo announced that the proposed Environmental Bond Act was being withdrawn from the November 2020 ballot on account of the state government’s financial problems. Quarry Waters had been counting on inclusion in a successful bond act.
Proponents of the site’s transformation into a public park, which has been a long time in coming, were disappointed.
The night before the governor’s announcement, the environmental group Scenic Hudson had conducted a Zoom meeting soliciting public input into the design of Quarry Waters Park, which straddles the line between the City of Kingston and Town of Ulster, north of Kingston Point and the Hutton Brickyards and south of the Kingston/Rhinecliff Bridge.
Virtual attendees at the long-planned session were given a video tour of the site, shown photos of existing structures and given design ideas of what might be done there. They were asked to participate in a flash poll indicating where they lived and what uses of the new park were most important to them. The meeting had been intended as the first step in an extended visioning process.
State funding anticipated
Scenic Hudson, whose land trust created a subsidiary called Quarry Waters, LLC to acquire the site in October 2019, needed state funding for improvements. The site has been extensively quarried for cement and mined for brickmaking. An artificial lake that formed in a hollow where cement rock was extracted for many decades has become an alluring destination for fans of the perilous sport of cliff-diving. Off-road vehicles have used the site’s trails and open areas for many years, adding to the scarification of the landscape. Unstable abandoned industrial structures from the Hudson Cement era (1957-1985) are also cause for concern. The property has remained closed to the public for years now.
Scenic Hudson senior park planner Heather Blaikie, one of the presenters of the July 29 online meeting, said that the organization had hoped to allow access to some of the new park’s trails before the end of 2020. The key event that would trigger reopening was to be completion of the northern spur of the City of Kingston’s Greenline trail. The site’s top initial attraction was to be the creation of the Hudson Landing Promenade, traversing the site’s 1.3-mile-long shoreline and serving as the link between two segments of the 750-mile Empire State Trail.
The schedule setback won’t derail Scenic Hudson’s planning. The involvement of the Poughkeepsie-based environmental organization in the site dates back to its acquisition by the Yonkers-based real estate firm AVR Acquisition Corp. from Tilcon Minerals in 2005. An AVR subsidiary called Kingston Landing Development proposed a market-rate residential development with 1682 housing units. In its initial conception, it would have been essentially a gated community, marketed to people who could afford it.
In the original plan, the waterfront, woodlands and lakes would have been closed to public use. Access by land would be via expansion of North Street.
Smaller project approved
The largest environmental organization in the Hudson Valley, Scenic Hudson now has 66 employees and $20 million in annual revenues plus a formidable universe of connections and relationships. It’s been an environmental powerhouse for decades. In Ulster County, its major areas of focus include farmland preservation a well as parks in the the Black Creek area and the Hudson River waterfront, plus the connections involving the Empire State Trail and the Walkway Over the Hudson.
The continuing and oft-expressed interest of such a major regional player as Scenic Hudson in Kingston Landing’s future a decade and a half ago did not go unnoticed.
Scenic Hudson organized a community coalition, the Friends of Kingston Waterfront, to press for changes to the design, including a paved, bicycle-friendly riverfront promenade. It conducted visual, traffic and habitat impact studies of the site and its environs.
AVR made some concessions. It was not eager to go to war.
Ray Curran, one of the prime movers behind the creation of Kingston’s Midtown Arts District and formerly the chief urban planner and landscape architect on Scenic Hudson’s staff, drafted an alternative design for Kingston Landing that scaled down the density considerably. After much negotiation with the planning boards of the two impacted municipalities, a compromise plan obtained its needed permits. The project seemed set to go ahead.
Then the 2008 recession hit. The bottom dropped out of the housing market. AVR, active in several other East-Coast communities, got cold feet about the Kingston Landing project. The Hudson Landing website, which once gave periodic updates on the project, no longer exists.
Since then, Scenic Hudson has been busy finding donors willing to help its land trust turn the property into a public park, featuring 260 acres of undisturbed woodlands, more than a mile of riverfront offering sweeping views, a high cliff and ridgeline and 37 acres of wetlands.
Some sheltered pockets of the acreage are being targeted for study and monitoring as “climate refuge areas.” A landing area for canoes and kayaks is part of the grand plan, along with bulkheads to buffer lower-lying riparian areas against sea-level rise. At least one structurally sound building, a cluster of huge concrete silos, may be preserved to house exhibits about the park’s industrial history. The graffiti art covering other ruins may be preserved.
Planning what’s next
“Scenic Hudson looks forward to continuing our dialogue with residents and stakeholders in the City of Kingston and Town of Ulster to envision a future for the park that maximizes its benefits to local communities and the region,” Scenic Hudson executive director Ned Sullivan said in a July 31 statement. “This engagement process began very successfully last Wednesday when more than 200 people joined us for a virtual tour and discussion. We are very encouraged by the turnout and participants’ excitement about the project.”
Sullivan said that Scenic Hudson protected the land because of its enormous potential to connect people to the inspiring power of nature and the Hudson River. “We and our partners remain committed to achieving our shared vision for this special place. It will be an outstanding asset for surrounding communities and the entire Hudson Valley.”
There will now be more time to think about what Quarry Waters will become. Community members and potential park users are invited to weigh in at https://quarrywatersparkinfo.org.
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