In 2009, the Bronx River Alliance, together with the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation and Mathews Nielsen Landscape Architects, P.C. launched a participatory process to develop a new vision for Shoelace Park and Fort Knox, a long-overlooked one-and-a-half mile-long stretch of parkland along the Bronx River in the North Bronx. This award-winning plan was funded by the New York State Department of State, Office of Coastal, Local Government & Community Sustainability.

The Alliance pulled together a steering committee, a public outreach committee, held two public design meetings, and also worked with local schools, the Community Board, local elected officials and others to develop the plan, which outlines the community's vision for integrating recreational space with the unique ecological value of the Bronx River -- New York City's only freshwater river.

Click on Explore Map Plans to view the Shoelace Master Plan in map form. Or click Full Shoelace Master Plan to download the full Shoelace Park Master Plan. We have also made segments of the Shoelace Park Master Plan available for download. Click Segmented Plan to download specific portions of the plan.

The Shoelace Park master plan has already triggered several positive initiatives for Shoelace Park. It galvanized a group of community residents to form Friends of Shoelace Park and begin caring for and advocating for the park. It set the vision and priorities for fundraising. Our first wins are another Environmental Protection Fund grant for path and planting improvements and funding from several sources for stormwater capture and erosion control. It enabled us to direct improvements to key locations in the short-term and envision the long-term future of this park. Small wonder, then, that the plan won four awards: from the NYC Design Commission, from The Waterfront Center, and from the ASLA New Jersey and New York chapters.