Fred Garner Park

Photos of Fred Garner Park canoe launch and river – July 2, 2007

Rededication Ceremony – June 6, 2007

(Photos by Jane Winn, BEAT – click on thumbnail for a larger picture)
Canoe launch at Fred Garner Park
Looking upstream from the launch site
Looking downstream from the launch site
The canoe launch at Fred Garner Park. When the water is high this is a very narrow path to launch from. Looking upstream from the canoe launch on July 2, 2007. Fairly low water level. Looking downstream from the canoe launch.
The rock just downstream
Looking upstream at the launch between the two rocks

Looking downstream from the hill
The rock just downstream of the launch. In late June some found this a helpful rock – keeping the canoe from floating downstream. In the spring, when the water was flowing over the rock, it made it very difficult to launch into the rapid flow and get out around the rock quickly. Looking upstream from the path on top of the little hill at Fred Garner Park. The canoe launch is between the two large rocks, which makes it a real challenge to get out when the water is high and fast. Looking downstream from the path on top of the little hill at Fred Garner Park.
Where the east and west branch join together
vegetation growing through the rip rap
silt covering rip rap
At the end of the park, the East and West Branches of the Housatonic River meet – the confluence. Looking across the river, you can see places where vegetation is already growing up through the rip rap. Much of both the East and West Branch were rip rapped in the late 1930s and 40s. Also looking across the river, there are areas where silt is beginning to cover the rip rap.

Rededication Ceremony for Fred Garner Park

On a very chilly day in June, the 6th, a ceremony was held to rededicate Fred Garner Park on Pomeroy Avenue in Pittsfield following the use of the park as a staging area for part of the remediation of two miles of the East Branch of the Housatonic River by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and General Electric Company (GE). PCBs originally from the GE site in Pittsfield were removed from the river between the GE site and the confluence of the East and West branches of the Housatonic near Fred Garner Park.

Unfortunately, PCBs are still entering the river above and near the beginning of this “cleaned up” part of the river. (see GE and PCBs)

Many people attended the ceremony including Representative Smitty Pignatelli, City Councilors Gerald Lee and Matt Kerwood, member of the EPA, Mass. Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), and river advocates – including two who drove all the way up from Connecticut, Judy Herkimer of the Housatonic Environmental Action League (HEAL) and Lynn Fowler of the Housatonic River Commission.

Ceremony at Fred Garner Park . Rep Smitty Pignatelli was in the crowd . Judy Herkimer, HEAL and Lynn Fowler

EPA Regional Administrator Robert Varney spoke as did Pittsfield Mayor James Ruberto and GE’s vice president for environmental programs Stephen Ramsey.

Tom Hickey, Mayor James Ruberto, and Steve Ramsey from GE . From the EPA, Bob Varney

Following the speeches there was a quick ribbon cutting at the start of the canoe launch.

About to cut the ribbon . ribbon just cut

Despite the chill in the air, BEAT’s Executive Director, Jane Winn, and Jenny Hersch, proponent for the Housatonic River Museum, still managed to end the ceremony by launching a canoe and taking a paddle first upstream under the Pomeroy Ave bridge, then down to the confluence of the remediated East Branch and the West Branch. They continued their paddle up the West Branch to explore the oxbow where PCBs had been detected at one time, but never remediated.

THANK YOU EVERYBODY!

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