Harlem River Festival 2012 Home

Celebrate the Harlem River: Party on the river

This year, the “2012 Harlem River Festival” will be a big celebration on the land and the water.  Plans include a week of events centering on the Bronx’ own New York State Park:  Roberto Clemente State Park, which has docks providing access onto the water.

•  During the week on Monday, October 15 to Friday, October 19, the Wilderness Inquiry programming will help make this our best event yet, enabling us to provide hundreds of school children a chance to get into a large (and supervised) canoe to learn firsthand about the river.

• On Saturday, October 20, the community will have a chance to attend and participate in what can only be described as a street fair on the land and in the water.

• Finally, on the evening of Wednesday, October 17, the Bronx Council for Environmental Quality will sponsor its annual Mini-Water Conference and invite scientists from USGS, EPA, DEC and DEP to discuss the condition of the River.

Events and Exhibits   –  News  –  Support  –  Map and Directions

This is the third annual public event organized by the Harlem River Working Group (HRWG), a group of community organizations, governmental agencies and other commercial stakeholders, focused on improving environmental quality and access to and along the Harlem River — from the Randall’s Island to the Hudson River in Bronx County, New York City. Formed in 2009, we have met monthly to organize and develop goals to ensure that a green corridor is established along as much of the length of the Harlem as possible, with habitat buffer, bike and walking path greenways and river access points.

In 2011, the Urban Waters Federal Partnership (UWFP) announced efforts on seven pilot locations, one of which is the Bronx & Harlem River Watersheds (New York).  Our area was chosen because both “locations had a strong restoration effort underway, spearheaded by local governments and community organizations.” The UWFP plans to transfer lessons learned from these pilot locations to other cities in the country.  In 2012, representatives from community organizations, city, state, and federal agencies convened on the EPA vessel “Clean Waters” and sailed to conduct a “Rapid Assessment” of the Harlem River corridor.  Local residents had the opportunity to stand at the rail side by side with experts from agencies such as NOAA, EPA, USFWS, USACE, USGS, USDA FS/NRS and point out long neglected issues that plague the river while also pointing out the hidden opportunities to reclaim the river.  All on board agreed to work together and identify projects that have a high feasibility of moving forward and improving the river.

Working to strengthen the Harlem River along the river’s Bronx side, we also made contact with the Manhattan BP and plan to work with them on a watershed approach toward protecting the waterway.  Since 2009, the National Park Service Rivers, Trails & Conservation Assistance Program has supplied invaluable technical assistance.

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