Village Preservation’s Tom Fox Photography Collection includes images of the Hudson River waterfront dating from the 1970s, 80s and 90s taken by Fox, who played an influential role in the research, planning, and advocacy for the redevelopment of the waterfront.
The first president of the Hudson River Park Conservancy, Fox completed the Concept and Financial Plan for the park. Many of the images show the waterfront in a state of neglect, disrepair, or misuse in the time before it was transformed into a public park.
Several of the photos were included in Fox’s 2024 book, Creating the Hudson River Park: Environmental and Community Activism, Politics, and Greed (watch a program about the book).
The book is a 40-year, first-person history of this project from the 1985 defeat of Westway, negotiating the 1998 Hudson River Park Act that officially created the Park, the 1999-2023 planning and construction focused on creating active and passive recreation opportunities on the Tribeca, Greenwich Village, Chelsea, and Hell’s Kitchen waterfronts, and the real estate development schemes in and adjacent to the park.
Tom Fox received numerous awards from professional, civic, and environmental organizations, a B.S. in Biology from Brooklyn College, and a Loeb Fellowship in Advanced Environmental Studies from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design.
The Fox Collection at the Brooklyn College Archives documents Tom Fox’s 50-year career in advocating for increased public open space.
Does your institution have a collection you’d like featured at New York Almanack? Send a description and illustration to John Warren at nyalmanack@gmail.com.
Photo: Sunning on the Hudson River’s Pier 51 at Jane Street in Greenwich Village, NYC, photo by Tom Fox, 1986 (courtesy Village Preservation).
Source link
