Today, NYC Parks hosted a “retirement party” for six former playground animal sculptures, and unveiled their new home in Flushing Meadows Corona Park – a passive, contemplative new area adjacent to the Unisphere, the “Home for Retired Playground Animals.”Īt NYC Parks, our civil servants take many forms: not only park workers, but also the beloved concrete animals children have been playing on for decades in our playgrounds across the city,” said NYC Parks Commissioner Sue Donoghue. I wasn’t doing that before, but the arthritis had gotten worse,” said Dozier, who stopped swimming when the Aquatic Center closed.Six playground animal sculptures have been retired and moved to the park, with a newly created passive, contemplative home in Queens In the last year, I had to start using a cane, and now I’m using a walker. “It being closed for three years, a lot of us - including myself - started having physical problems. Parks-run outdoor pools lack the same kind of extensive programming, while pools run by private operators were often cost-prohibitive or inaccessible for people with disabilities, she said. “They go: ‘Is the pool open yet?’ And I was getting ready to get them to write letters.” “Even our doctors now - every time we go, they don’t say ‘How are you?’” Dozier said. Until the pool closed in 2020, Dozier had been visiting the aquatic center five days a week to tend to her arthritis with the help of 45-minute water aerobic classes. She learned to swim at the aquatic center about five years ago, she told THE CITY, because it’s something she “always wanted to do” despite her ongoing fear of drowning. Mary Dozier, a 74-year-old who donned a rosette-covered swim cap, came in from Nassau County with her husband and a childhood friend for the occasion. ‘Is The Pool Open Yet?’Īfter the long wait, swimmers who had relied on the aquatic center were eager to take a dip again. “When I took office last year, this was probably my number one phone call - about when this aquatic center will be open,” Ung said. The netting remains in place in the meantime.Ĭity Councilmember Sandra Ung, a Democrat representing the adjacent area of Flushing, said members of her community have been waiting a long time for the neighborhood pool’s reopening. Braddick said that Parks is still working on determining an exact timeline for the repair work and that future closures will be kept to a “minimum time period.” The planned roof reconstruction will require the pool to close again, little more than 15 years after it first opened as part of NYC’s bid (which proved unsuccessful) to host the 2012 Olympics.

“There’s some moisture that’s coming in from the top and the bottom, and so we’re working on figuring out exactly what’s possible,” Braddick told THE CITY. That roof, capped with a distinctive wave design, is still being assessed for repairs the Parks Department estimates will begin in 2025, according to Deputy Commissioner for Capital Projects Therese Braddick. The happy day came 163 weeks after the Olympics-caliber center first shut its doors in January 2020 for what was supposed to be “at least six weeks” to install emergency netting for its crumbling roof. Dozens of swimmers descended into a pool at the Flushing Meadows Corona Aquatic Center on Monday morning as Department of Parks and Recreation Commissioner Sue Donoughue blew a whistle to signal its long-anticipated - albeit temporary - reopening.

Flushing meadows corona park nyc