Parks

You must be this tall to ride the wind turbine? Lines of be-fanny-packed tourists shuffling sadly for 45 minutes to see the photovoltaic panels? Lou Gramm sans Foreigner playing the bummer amphitheater by the wind farm? Anything's possible, but the idea of a Green Energy Theme Park doesn't necessarily sound like a winner off the bat, at least if the idea is to make money on licensed merchandise and overpriced snacks. That isn't what the Bloomberg administration has in mind with its Renewable Energy Park project on Ward's Island, though -- this project is really more about demonstrating the possibly transformative power of alternative energy for life in New York. The planned park, designed by Natural Currents Energy Group, is finally going forward after years of wrangling over funding and rights to the space on the southern tip of Ward's Island.

Opened in 1990 as something of a pork product designed to boost the fortunes of Staten Island's fraying north shore, Homeport Naval Base was closed just four years later. That left 36 acres of potentially desirable waterfront property -- and Homeport's single 1,410-foot pier -- vacant, and Staten Island's erstwhile "gold coast" just as tarnished as it had been before. The site remained fallow even after ownership reverted to the city in 1995, with a host of Giuliani-administration development plans coming to naught. Now, five years after Mayor Bloomberg launched a task force on Homeport's development and three years after the area was rezoned, something is finally happening at Homeport.