Talk Bronx New York

Councilman James Vacca fuming mad at Citgo stations

This Citgo gas station, on the Southbound side of the Hutchinson River Parkway, is one of the highest priced gas stations in the Bronx.

Councilman James Vacca got the city to take action against the high prices at the Citgo stations on the Hutch.

They should pour this gas from a Champagne bottle.

A Bronx lawmaker hit the gas price ceiling over what two local gas stations on leased city land were charging motorists - and got results.

Councilman James Vacca took aim at the CITGO gas stations on the Hutchinson River Parkway near East Tremont Ave., where gas prices started at $4.49 last week. According to the American Automobile Association, the average price in the city is $4.12.

“Historically, these gas stations have been the highest in the borough by far,” Vacca said. “Even now, with the current crisis we face, they continue to be the highest. When I saw that it hit $4.49, that was the last straw.”

In a letter to the city Parks and Recreation Department, which owns the land, Vacca called on Commissioner Adrian Benepe to terminate the lease of the twin stations, which face each other on opposite sides of the parkway.

“These two stations are notorious for charging 25 to 35 cents more than stations only three blocks away,” Vacca wrote in a May 23 letter.

A listing of gas prices on MSN.com showed the two CITGO stations ranked as the most expensive in the Bronx.

Vacca’s office has been fielding numerous complaints about the prices.

“With residents of the Bronx feeling the pinch of ever-increasing gas prices every day,” Vacca wrote, “it is unconscionable that the city would tolerate flagrant price-gouging.”

In response, Parks officials said they are sending the concessionaire, Super Value, a “Notice to Cure” that states their gas prices are inconsistent with prices charged at other area stations.

The notice orders the owners to immediately adjust their prices accordingly to comply with the terms of their contract. An inspector is to follow up.

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Who Says: We should have known this was coming. Just wait until the start tearing down the old stadium and find that the land is contaminated from an oil leak from the stadiums oil tanks..

Time and Cost Rise for Yankee Stadium Parks

 Anthony Santiago, left, and his twin brother, Christopher, playing in a temporary park at Jerome Avenue and East 161st Street.

 Cost estimates for eight small parks around the new Yankee Stadium have almost doubled.

The cost of replacing two popular parks where the new Yankee Stadium is being built has nearly doubled. At the same time, several of the eight new parks, which were supposed to be completed before the new stadium opens next spring, have been delayed by as much as two years, according to city documents.

The price of the new small parks — which are to replace tennis and basketball courts, a running track and baseball and soccer fields eliminated to make way for the new stadium — is now projected to be $174 million, almost one-seventh the cost of the $1.3 billion stadium itself. The original estimate had been $95.5 million. The increase comes amid skyrocketing costs for construction projects, both public and private, around the city.

The stadium is being financed by the Yankees with city subsidies, while the eight new parks for the South Bronx, which range in size from 0.24 acre to 8.9 acres, are being paid for by the city.

None of the replacement parks have been completed, and construction on several has not yet started; however, the parks department has built a temporary replacement park on a parking lot in the area, opened a ball field this spring at a school almost a mile to the east, and is building a sports field at a recreation center about a mile to the north.

The city was required to build the new parks after it selected the 28.4-acre Macombs Dam Park and a portion of the 18.5-acre John Mullaly Park as the site of the new stadium in 2005. State and federal law dictated that a similar amount of parkland nearby of equal or greater fair market value be built to replace the parks that would be lost.

Some residents have been critical of the trade-off. While Macombs Dam and Mullaly Parks were almost contiguous stretches of grass and trees amid the concrete topography of the South Bronx, the replacement parks are small parcels scattered around the area. The sites include sports fields atop a planned stadium parking garage and a park along the Harlem River, which is on the opposite side of the Major Deegan Expressway.

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Replacing Parkland Gets Pricier In Yankee Stadium Plan

The bill for replacing parkland bulldozed to make way for a new Yankee Stadium has soared by almost 50 percent, officials said.

Unforeseen environmental problems and other hitches have raised the estimated cost from $128 million to $190 million, parks officials said at a City Council hearing Wednesday.

Still, they don’t plan to pare down the plan. It calls for creating 28 acres of new parkland and includes turning the old stadium into a children’s ballpark.

The Yankees’ new home field is slated to open in 2009 on parkland across the street from their storied South Bronx ballpark. The deluxe new stadium’s price tag also has risen _ to $1.3 billion, up from a $1 billion estimate last year.

The Yankees have said the lost parkland would be replaced. That has proven more expensive than expected because of such surprises as an old, underground oil tank that had to be drained and removed from one piece of new park, Parks and Recreation Commissioner Adrian Benepe said.

But parks officials said the project was progressing. One small ballfield at an elementary school is set to open next month, and some other facilities in June.

SOURCE: NewsDay.com

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 Adrian Benepe

Greener Ways As Path For Bronx Under Mayor’s Plan

We are currently in the largest period of park expansion since Robert Moses and the WPA projects of the 1930s.

With a capital budget of $2.9 billion over the next 10 years, we are building innovative parks and facilities across the city on an unprecedented scale. From the concrete plants and brownfields that once lined the Bronx waterfront to the Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island, we are transforming the city with waterfront parks, kayak launches, bike trails, athletic fields, playgrounds and natural areas.

Thanks to the support of Mayor Bloomberg and the City Council, we will care for parks with a robust operating budget of almost $380 million, up from $180 million in 2000.

In the Bronx, new and renovated parks are transforming communities and improving the quality of life. Just in the last five years, more than $158 million has been invested in Bronx park improvements, including new waterfront parks, greenways and recreational facilities.

Over the next five years, Parks will invest more than $600 million to develop park projects in the Bronx, including completing long-unfinished Soundview Park and restoring the High Bridge to create the Bronx’s next great regional parks as part of Mayor Bloomberg’s PlaNYC, a sweeping road map to the sustainable growth of New York City.

Some $220 million comes from the construction of the Croton Water Filtration Plant and is being spent on improvements to over 70 Bronx parks, with 13 complete, 19 in construction and 43 projects currently in design.

Ongoing projects include Seton Falls Park, Mount Hope Playground, Manida Ballfield, Clark Playground, Devoe Park and Aqueduct Lands Playground, and we expect to begin construction on all the remaining park projects before the fall of 2009.

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