Melissa Cronin

On Wednesday, the last day of school, dozens of students hung up their Gone Fishin’ signs – literally. Along the East River esplanade, kids of various ages tried out their angling skills at a fishing clinic hosted by the Lower East Side Ecology Center.

“Our goal with fishing clinics is to get people down here to learn about the river,” said Daniel Tainow, the center’s educational director. “We want to teach people that there are things they can do to help protect the quality of the river.”

While kids threw back anything they hooked, a little further up the river, near the Williamsburg Bridge, it was a different story.

“I eat whatever I catch,” said Wilfredo Castro, one of several East Village residents who lounged by their fishing poles. He fishes on the river almost every day. “The ecosystem is healthy. That’s why the fish like it,” he said. Read more…

Stephen Rex Brown

The neighborhood’s top shop for photocopies, the Source Unltd., is one of 11 business in the Lower East Side and East Village that scored grant money to make environmentally friendly upgrades.

Thanks to the money from the Lower East Side Ecology Center — $1,000 is the maximum grant available — the copy store bought a new awning that will decrease its air conditioner use. It went up last week.

“We’re on the sunny side of the street here, so it makes the air conditioner run a little less, especially with the summer coming up,” said Santo Mollica, who opened Source Unltd. in 1982. “From noon to four we get bombarded, you know.” Read more…

An interactive map allows users to submit Blueway ideas.

“The west side has the High Line, Hudson River Park, Chelsea Piers,” said Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer at the first community-wide planning meeting for the East River Blueway. “Now it’s time for the East Side to have an iconic outdoor space.”

In its planning stages since September 2011, the Blueway aims to make the East River more accessible, with beautified walkways, from the Brooklyn Bridge to East 38th Street. Yesterday’s meeting brought together residents, politicians, and members of Community Board 6 as well as the project’s design team to share ideas regarding water access, biking routes, and improved water quality for swimming, kayaking and fishing.

Crossing the FDR is currently a major obstacle to accessing the river. According to Adam Lubinsky, Managing Principal of WXY Architecture + Urban Design, the East Side has only half the number of street crossings – including underpasses, overpasses and street level pathways – as the West Side. “How can we engage with a river that we’ve been separated from for so long?” asked Mr. Lubinsky. Read more…

Ian Duncan Two bloodgood plane trees in front of the Village East apartments on Avenue C have been cited as a danger by residents.

There they are. The pair of them, standing on Avenue C as plain as day, unaware of the trouble they’ve been causing.

They being, not two juvenile delinquents, but twin bloodgood plane trees that recently arrived unannounced on the sidewalk in front of the Village East co-op.

The issue of arboreal interlopers blew up at a Community Board 3 parks committee meeting on June 16. Anne Johnson, a board member and resident at Village East, said it was unfair of the parks department, acting with the Lower East Side Ecology Center, to plant trees without consulting residents.

“We want them placed somewhere else,” Ms. Johnson said at the meeting. “They are a danger,” she added, arguing that they present an obstacle to wheel chair users.

Currently the trees are bounded by bright yellow tape stamped with the word “caution.”

In an e-mail message, Ms. Johnson emphasized that residents were displeased by the placement of the trees and others approached by The Local last week seemed similarly miffed. Village East has its own active buildings and grounds committee and Ms. Johnson cited one resident’s concerns that the trees will distract observers from Village East’s existing planters.
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