Climate and Community Resilience at Floyd Bennett Field: Progress Report

Floyd Bennett Field is one of New York City’s greatest treasures. With roots in New York City’s aviation history as the city’s first municipal airport, its unique ecosystem provides a rare experience for the public to interact with 1,300 acres of uninterrupted wide open spaces and grasslands; experience wildlife on the Atlantic flyway; relate to water; and embark on activities and knowledge- building that speak to Floyd Bennett Field’s exceptional location on Jamaica Bay. Floyd Bennett Field provides a truly democratic space where New Yorkers and visitors can interact. Equity is a central tenet to the work at Floyd Bennett Field as we plan for its future.

Floyd Bennett Field has the potential to become one of the region’s premier hubs for innovation, economic opportunity and academic research to accompany an existing multitude of recreational uses. By activating underutilized historic buildings and green spaces and investing in infrastructural improvements, the Jamaica Bay Rockaway-Parks Conservancy (JBRPC) in partnership with the Science and Resilience Institute at Jamaica Bay (SRIJB) and National Park Service (NPS) believe Floyd Bennett Field has the potential to unlock unique opportunities offered nowhere else in New York and advance the next phase of park history along historic Hangar Row as the Floyd Bennett Field Innovation Hub. Opportunities for adaptive reuse of buildings at Floyd Bennett Field are possible as demonstrated by the successful redevelopment of the historic Brooklyn Navy Yard.

UPDATE: In March 2022, Gateway National Recreation Area released to opportunities at Floyd Bennett Field: Request for Proposals for Overnight Camping at Floyd Bennett Field and Fort Wadsworth and Request for Expressions of Interest for Hangars 5, 6, 7, and 8.

The Progress Report reflects on eight years of steadfast work by JBRPC, SRIJB and their partners to champion Floyd Bennett Field as one of the city, state and nation’s most precious resources for urban recreation and marine stewardship. JBRPC and SRIJB have been working together since 2013 to re-imagine the future of Jamaica Bay and transform this urban tidal estuary and its parks into a hub for coastal resilience, academic research and education while remaining grounded in community input and equity. Floyd Bennett Field offers SRIJB an opportunity to bring cutting-edge research to its varying public spaces. Exciting opportunities include: establishing a physical home for SRIJB at Floyd Bennett Field; laying the groundwork for an economic and innovation hub that will create upwardly mobile green jobs to provide transformational career and low-barrier job opportunities; and continuing to enhance the visitor experience for those visiting Floyd Bennett Field with new park amenities.

The purpose of the Progress Report is to:

1. Celebrate the work and effort from the past eight years of JBRPC, SRIJB and partners while looking towards Floyd Bennett Field’s future;

2. Formalize the status of SRIJB as an official institute at the City University of New York;

3. Establish an action plan to develop Floyd Bennett Field as a place for research, education, innovation, recreation and workforce development, and utilize $7.5 million in capital funds designated for the SRIJB resilience center to build a research center at the park;

4. Complete the vision for Floyd Bennett Field’s Hangar Row by rehabilitating Hangars 3 and 4, and the historic Sheet Metal Shop, into an Innovation Hub that will provide the public with new park amenities, job opportunities and educational opportunities;

5. Strengthen and expand the role of CUNY campuses in the SRIJB, and collaborate with a larger network of research organizations to further the mission of JBRPC, SRIJB and the NPS;

6. Identify reliable and sustainable funding streams to ensure financial stability for JBRPC and SRIJB;

7. Integrate community knowledge and establish partnerships with neighbors, elected officials, educators, students, local businesses and arts and culture partners and industries by providing opportunities for green workforce development and cutting-edge solutions to the climate crisis;

8. Capitalize on city, state and federal funding efforts to promote equity and resiliency, and investment in Jamaica Bay and Rockaway Parks; and

9. Build awareness, excitement and support for an inclusive and equitable future of Floyd Bennett Field and all of Jamaica Bay and Rockaway Parks.

With the help of consultants Bolton-St. Johns, Hester Street and Sterling Project Development, JBRPC, SRIJB and their partners have reflected on their work together and have co-created an action plan to move forward with their efforts to advance the work at Floyd Bennett Field. It was paramount that the Progress Report be grounded in the voices of key stakeholders including elected officials, governmental agencies, schools and community partners. Over the course of three months, project partners conducted interviews and surveys with these groups and individuals to gather their input on Floyd Bennett Field’s future. Findings reaffirmed prior ideas, strengthened existing partnerships and generated additional possibilities for the future.

The time to transform Floyd Bennett Field is now. In the midst of a global pandemic and the uprisings for racial justice, we have seen the importance of equitable access to nature; how access to secure career and job opportunities is a lifeline; and how the devastation caused by climate change is indiscriminate but disproportionately impacts low-income Black and Brown communities. There is current momentum at the city, state and federal level to invest in infrastructure and our most vulnerable communities, and Floyd Bennett Field is well positioned to serve communities most in need. As we celebrate the upcoming 50th anniversary of Gateway National Recreation Area, we have the opportunity to realize a vision for Gateway decades in the making by transforming the park into a research and economic hub that will shape the next fifty years and beyond at Jamaica Bay.