Opinion: Metropolitan Park is an environmental win for Queens

Costa Constantinides, the chief executive officer at the Variety Boys & Girls Club of Queens and former member of the New York City Council, where he served as chair of the Council’s Environmental Protection Committee. Eagle file photo by Jonathan Sperling

By Costa Constantinides

Asphalt is not a park. Concrete is not green. A parking lot does not save us from flooding. These are the realities of the current parking lot adjacent to Citi Field.

Since its inception by Robert Moses as World’s Fair parking, this space has only been an empty slab where the sun beats down on the asphalt making our neighborhoods hotter. And when it rains, it further burdens our neighborhoods with its inability to capture rainwater. In fact, the closest this area comes to being an actual park is in the sign that says “parking.” It cannot continue this way.

Queens deserves better than 50 acres of asphalt. We deserve a realistic solution based on facts. We deserve Metropolitan Park, and all the environmental solutions that come with it. And with climate change increasingly making these challenges worse, we deserve action now.

This parking lot is more than just a place where we park cars during Mets games. It is also where heat gets parked throughout the summer. The heat from the sun is captured in the concrete creating a heat island effect that not only increases the heat index of the parking lot itself but the surrounding communities. This has far more impact than just the rising temperature. Heat can exacerbate respiratory illness, like asthma, cause heart conditions to worsen and heat stroke can kill without the presence of these underlying symptoms.

While it may soak up the sun, asphalt does not soak up the rain. More and more often, we are seeing massive storms flood our community. Where does all that water go? Normally the soil, grass, trees and bioswales will absorb the water and filter it, but that isn’t the case in this sea of asphalt. Instead, polluted rainwater flows unfiltered into Flushing Bay or floods the surrounding area.

On top of the heat and flooding, this parking lot is only built for one thing: parking. Hundreds of idling cars add to the pollution and air quality issues - making the conditions even more environmentally unfriendly.

Our community deserves better than this. We can change the law, and we can change the environmental outcomes here at Citi Field.

Metropolitan Park is a real proposal that will transform the parking lot into a full-fledged park and finally help to address the climate issues facing our community. With Metropolitan Park, our new normal can be acres of green parks and athletic fields rather than scorching hot and flood-prone asphalt. We can have new sewer infrastructure and build resilient structures keeping polluted runoff out of Flushing Bay. New transportation options including an overhaul of the 7-train station, new bike lanes and a network of pedestrian walkways will help to make cars and parking less of a focus. We will also see a commitment to a lower carbon footprint with green roofs, solar power and visionary sustainability implementation.

This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to not only build a climate ready Queens but to transform our community. Metropolitan Park is an $8 billion investment and entirely privately funded, meaning all of these benefits without us taxpayers giving a dollar to construct it. To boot, this proposal is not only sustainable but financially viable with live entertainment, gambling, and restaurants creating the project’s economic engine and adding thousands of good jobs as part of the package.

The time is now. We can’t afford to let this opportunity slip away and these issues will only get worse.

Costa Constantinides is the chief executive officer at the Variety Boys & Girls Club of Queens and was a member of the New York City Council from 2014 to 2021, where he served as chair of the Council’s Environmental Protection Committee.