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Only in New York could a single acre of hedges, urns and neoclassical whimsy fuel a decade of political battles. Elizabeth Street Garden, Nolita’s most Instagram-friendly patch of greenery and the subject of one of the city’s most emotionally charged land-use fights, is back in the news. This time question isn’t whether it will be demolished, but whether it will become a legitimate New York City park.
The plot twist arrived earlier this month, when a member of mayor Eric Adams’ administration wrote in a letter that the city “unequivocally and permanently dedicates this property to public use as parkland,” Gothamist reported. The single phrase, tucked inside a letter to parks commissioner Iris Rodriguez-Rosa, dramatically raised the stakes: building anything on the site would now require approval from the state legislature, meaning future mayors wouldn't touch the property without Albany’s blessing.
The move wasn’t entirely surprising given the plot’s history. Earlier this year, Adams abandoned his support for Haven Green, a 123-unit affordable housing development for seniors that would’ve replaced the garden, and instead struck a deal with Councilmember Christopher Marte to rezone three other sites in Lower Manhattan. Adams’ administration claims that those rezonings could yield more than 600 affordable homes, five times the number planned for Elizabeth Street. Housing groups blasted the reversal, while open-space advocates considered it a long-overdue return to sanity.
Then came the mayoral election. Incoming mayor Zohran Mamdani campaigned on reviving the original housing plan, promising as well to evict the garden’s non-profit tenant in his first year. The new parkland designation now makes that a much harder promise to deliver. During an appearance last week, Mamdani blasted Adams’ eleventh-hour maneuver as “[cementing] a legacy of dysfunction and inconsistency,” arguing that the move undermines urgently-needed affordable housing for older New Yorkers.
Still, Adams, in his final weeks in City Hall, appears intent on locking in the garden’s future as a public green space. “We are committed to ensuring Elizabeth Street Garden remains a beloved community park and cannot be alienated in the future,” said first deputy mayor Randy Mastro in a statement. Mamdani insists that the fight isn’t over, but asking Albany to “alienate” newly dedicated parkland will be a heavy lift, especially when the outgoing administration has negotiated an alternative path to creating affordable housing.
In other words, the Elizabeth Street Garden is closer than ever to becoming a legally protected, publicly accessible park, no longer living under threat of demolition. But whether that status becomes ironclad or gets dragged into yet another chapter of the city’s most operatic zoning saga now rests with a mayor-elect, a state legislature and one very small but very consequential acre of greenery.