By Patrick Hedlund
DNAinfo News Editor
LOWER EAST SIDE — The great granddaughter of Franklin D. Roosevelt joined the Parks Department and other Lower East Side and Chinatown stakeholders to celebrate the opening of the new Hester Street Playground Thursday.
The playground — which lies at the foot of Sara D. Roosevelt Park on Hester Street between Chrystie and Forsyth streets — recently underwent a $5 million renovation to revitalize the crumbling 1980s-era recreation space.
“This might have been the worst playground in the City of New York,” Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe told a crowd that included children from the University Settlement School and MS 131.
In planning the project, the nonprofit Hester Street Collaborative reached out to a host of local groups to solicit feedback on the playground’s design.
“It was atypical,” the Collaborative’s executive director, Anne Frederick, said of the community-based planning process.
“It became this whole team effort,” she added. “Presenting ideas and letting folks in the neighborhood have ownership.”
The result is a state-of-the-art space that includes play areas for kids of all ages, a sandbox and spray showers, tiles designed by local schoolchildren and nearby bathrooms.
Funding for the playground was provided primarily through $4.4 million from the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, as well as $250,000 each from former Councilman Alan Gerson and the New York State Environmental Protection Fund.
The new playground comes as part of a $50 million push by the Parks Department to develop more parks in lower Manhattan, Benepe said.
“These are probably the busiest parks and playgrounds in the world,” the commissioner added of the recreational space in District 3, which includes the Lower East Side, East Village and Chinatown.
Cristina Roosevelt — the great-great granddaughter of Sara D. Roosevelt — said it was an honor to cut the ribbon on a playground that bears her family’s name.
“To see the joy on the children’s faces down here is just remarkable,” said the native New Yorker. “It fills you with such a sense of pride.”
