After years of anticipation, fund-raising, and restoration closely followed by local media, the park on the High Line finally opens today. Sitting 29 feet over the meatpacking district and west Chelsea, the first section of the public park—which sparked a construction boom in the surrounding area—was unveiled to the press yesterday at a ribbon cutting ceremony officiated by Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
The mile-and-a-half-long swath of green landscape, stretching from Gansevoort to West 20th Streets and designed by James Corner Field Operations and Diller, Scofidio & Renfro, includes linear concrete planked walkways surrounded by trees and wild flowers, a sun deck, an area for public art exhibitions, and the remnants of its past life as an elevated rail structure. Open daily, from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., the park has no official plan yet for event rentals.
What is certain is that nonprofit organization Friends of the High Line will operate in a similar way to the Central Park Conservancy: Although the park is under the jurisdiction of the Department of Parks & Recreation, the Friends of the High Line will be responsible for its maintenance and operations and is likely to be in charge of booking the site for events.
"We're working with the city right now to determine how events can take place on the High Line, but the projected answer is yes, there will be events that can take place up here," said Joshua David, co-founder of Friends of the High Line. "There are complexities about having events up here—we don't have a freight elevator, we don't have back-of-house facilities. And the thing to remember is that first and foremost it is a public park, so any event that takes place up here can't unduly interfere with the public's ability to enjoy the park."
That said, Friends of the High Line is expected to raise more than 70 percent of the annual operating budget for High Line park. "Doing events is one of the things that helps us raise revenue for the maintenance and operations of this beautiful public park. We need to look at all different ways to fund-raise, and doing events is one of them," David said. "We have a couple of spaces that we think will be viable for event use. The [covered] space on 14th Street and the interior space under the Chelsea Market. Those will be viable for events in the future, we just don't have all of the concrete details about the policy and pricing."
Next week, as previously reported, the nonprofit and Calvin Klein will host what is being billed as the first party on the High Line, the after-party for the organization's annual summer gala. The Target High Line Street Festival, a public event in the meatpacking district, is planned for Sunday, July 12, and section 2 of the High Line—West 20th to 30th Streets—is slated to open next year.
