Hike-toberfest- 9/29/18
Hike, Eat, Drink & Celebrate with Friends during our fun fundraiser for the hiking trails of Van Cortlandt Park. Come see why VCP is Where NYC Hikes. Hike starts at 2pm and attendees will participate in a 4-5 mile hike or a 2 mile leisurely hike. Oktoberfest is from 4pm-7pm where there will be German food by Loreley Restaurant & Biergarten, Beer served by the Bronx Beer Hall and fun yard games provided by Loving the Bronx! Thank you to Yonkers Brewery, KelSo Beer Company and Captain Lawrence Brewing for donating beer for the event. Tickets, including Early Bird Discounts through the end of August, are on sale now.
Thank you to our Sponsors: Loreley Restaurant & Biergarten, Bronx Beer Hall, Van Cortlandt House Museum, Yonkers Brewery, KelSo Beer Company, Captain Lawrence Brewing, Food Dynasty and Van Cortlandt Track Club. Sponsorship Opportunities Available.
Exploring Local Forest Ecosystems Teacher Workshop Series
The Friends of Van Cortlandt Park are partnering with the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation to offer a hands-on, interactive course from August 20th to August 23rd that will put local environmental resources at participants’ fingertips. Participants will review content knowledge, model activities they can bring back to their classrooms (all aligned to NYC S&S), learn from guest speakers from local NYC environmental organizations and nonprofits, and explore environmental-focused websites. Participants will receive 3 books of lesson plans that are correlated to standards including Project WILD, Flying WILD, Project Learning Tree. Teachers can sign up for the entire workshop series through ASPDP to receive 2 credits (use this link to pay Education Partner Fee of $100) or register here for any of the individual workshops (no credits)- Project Wild, Flying Wild and/or Project Learning Tree.
Show Your Support for Daylighting Tibbetts Brook
Water from Van Cortlandt Lake enters the Broadway sewer at a rate of 4 to 5 million gallons of water per day — and that’s on a dry day. This water is then treated – for no reason- at the Wards Island Stormwater Treatment Plant. Often when it rains, the combination of sewage, street runoff and the brook enters the combined sewer, bypassing the treatment plant and flowing directly into the Harlem River. This one Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO), WI-056, connected to the Broadway sewer makes up more than half of the CSO water entering the Harlem River. Daylighting will remove this clean water from the sewer and help to reduce CSO occurrences on the Harlem River and help with flooding issues along Broadway and other areas of the Tibbetts Brook Watershed.
The Friends of VCP have joined forces with the Bronx Council for Environmental Quality to create a Coalition for the Daylighting of Tibbetts Brook. As of May 2018, Bronx Community Board 7, Bronx Community Board 8, The Bronx is Blooming, City as a Living Lab (CALL), Councilman Andrew Cohen, NYS Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz, Congressman Eliot Engel, Fort Independence Park Neighborhood Association, Kingsbridge Business Improvement District, Kingsbridge Riverdale Van Cortlandt Development Corp., Councilman Mark Levine, NYS Senator Jeffrey Klein, The Natural Areas Conservancy, New Yorkers for Parks, Northwest Bronx Community and Clergy Coalition, NYC H2O, Senator Gustavo Rivera, Riverkeeper, S.W.IM. Coalition, the Trust for Public Land, Van Cortlandt Park Conservancy and Wave Hill have signed on. If your group would like to sign on please email christina@vancortlandt.org . Individuals may add their support by signing our online Free Tibbetts Brook petition.
Watch this Video & Learn about the Friends
Click Here to Watch the Video Directly on YouTube.
Thank you to Next Round Productions for creating this wonderful video for us. Very special thank you to Partnerships for Parks for helping to fund the video!
Master Plan for Van Cortlandt Park
NYC Parks recently finalized a comprehensive Van Cortlandt Park Master Plan that will guide the restoration of Van Cortlandt Park’s natural beauty and provide solutions for the needs of all neighboring communities. The Master Plan charts clear courses of action to restore and improve this unique property. The Master Plan is intended to coordinate efforts over the next twenty years between agencies, nonprofit partners, elected officials and community groups to complete capital projects in Van Cortlandt Park. The Friends of Van Cortlandt Park look forward to helping to implement projects in this plan over the next 20 years.
FVCP in the New York Times!
FVCP was featured in a recent New York Times article New York Parks in Less Affluent Areas Lack Big Gifts.
The Friends of Van Cortlandt Park are a 501c3 nonprofit organization.
Our EIN is 13-3843182.
