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CB 2 backs dog run in Sunnyside's Torsney Park |
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Written by Adam Pincus, Times Ledger
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Thursday, 08 June 2006 |
Sores of pet owners cheered on speakers in support of a dog run in a Sunnyside park that won the support of Community Board 2 members during its monthly meeting.
About 60 people joined some 50 board members at the meeting last Thursday at the Sunnyside Senior Center at 43-31 39th St. in Sunnyside.
The canine lovers came to push for dog runs in two locations in the district. The board also voted to disapprove a request from the city Department of Transportation to reverse a one-way street in Sunnyside and voted to support a zoning change for parts of Queens Boulevard in Woodside that would encourage limited affordable housing on the thoroughfare.
The board voted 35-4 to support a dog run in Torsney Park in Sunnyside and chose to defer a decision on the second location in Woodside near the intersection of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway and 65th Place.
The dozen or more speakers who came to voice their opinions on the dog runs were overwhelmingly supportive.
In other neighborhoods, such as in Juniper Park, neighborhood organizations have been less welcoming to canine owners who wanted to create a dog run for their four-legged friends.
At the CB 2 meeting, the proponents listed a number of benefits for the community, including greater safety from the added presence and more community interaction.
Rick Duro, the co-chairman for the Sunnyside United Dog Society, or SUDS, said the run would be about 25 feet by 90 feet, and would be on the western edge of Torsney Park. The run would be walled on two sides on the other sides by proposed 12-foot chain link fences.
Duro said Tuesday that the approval was a vote of confidence by the board for the plan."The Parks Department and the community board saw that we were serious," he said. "We were turned down before, but we did not give up... until we got the right spot."
Duro said the next step was to meet with the Parks Department and to find funding, which that agency will not provide.
Duro estimated the project would cost under $50,000.
A Queens Department of Parks official present at the meeting said his agency would make a contract with SUDS, which would be responsible for the dog run.
Sunnyside resident and cocker spaniel owner Phyllie Conroy said her dog was recently injured by a soccer player, and she wanted the run as a safe place for her dog to play.
"It is about fairness," she told the board. "The dog to me is like a child, and I want her to be safe."
The proposal for Sherry Park was not so lucky.
Virginia Hahn, a member of Woodside Organization of Furry Friends, or WOOF, said a dog run would help local residents as much as their animals.
"I need a place to socialize my dog," she said. But she added that bringing dogs together helps unify the neighborhood. "It brings people of all walks of life together."
That proposal, however, was tabled, Chairman Joseph Conley said.
The board rejected a proposal by the city Department of Transportation to change the direction of a road in Woodside. The plan would have changed 39th Place between 51st and 50th avenues to a one-way northbound, from its current one-way southbound. Local residents slammed the decision, saying it would bring unwanted traffic from cars exiting the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway.
The board also approved the language describing an affordable housing plan, known as inclusionary housing, that was pushed by Councilman Eric Gioia (D-Sunnyside), for stretches of Queens Boulevard in Woodside.
The housing plan would encourage affordable housing in the R7X zone, which will be on much of the boulevard from 50th Street to 73rd Street.
Reach reporter Adam Pincus by e-mail at
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or by phone at 718-229-0300, Ext. 154. |
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