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    Friends of the Upper East Side > Challenging Overdevelopment > Marx Brothers Playground / Co-op Tech Project > Make your voice heard! Tell Governor Cuomo to protect East Side parks

Make your voice heard! Tell Governor Cuomo to protect East Side parks

February 16, 2018

In December, FRIENDS filed a lawsuit alongside the Municipal Art Society, Carnegie Hill Neighbors, and CIVITAS in order to prevent the City from alienating a public park, the much-loved Marx Brothers Playground, to facilitate a massive, 1.3 million square foot private development that will rise over 700-feet on the site. New York City parkland does not generate development rights, and our government should not allow private developers to receive special legal treatment and take away public parkland in the process, in order to maximize profit. Read more about the lawsuit HERE in The New York Times.

For more than 70 years the Marx Brothers Playground, located on 96th Street between First and Second Avenues, has provided green space to the park-starved neighborhoods of theUpper East Side and East Harlem. By allowing this development, the City would set a dangerous precedent that puts more than 250 playgrounds citywide at risk of being mined for air rights.

What YOU can do to stop the attack on public parks:

Fill out to form below to send an email to  Governor Andrew Cuomo urging him to uphold New Yorkers’ right to accessible park land — regardless of development pressures or a corporate bottom line — by halting Avalon Bay’s development on 96th Street until the City’s alienation actions have been fully investigated.

Rendering of the 710 foot tall proposed tower (image by Perkins Eastman Architects).

MAS Jointly Operated Playgrounds Map

In December, FRIENDS filed a lawsuit alongside the Municipal Art Society, Carnegie Hill Neighbors, and CIVITAS in order to prevent the City from alienating a public park, the much-loved Marx Brothers Playground, to facilitate a massive, 1.3 million square foot private development that will rise over 700-feet on the site.

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