GAY CITY NEWS: A Promising Compromise on Village AIDS Memorial
BY PAUL SCHINDLER
As New York prepares to mark World AIDS Day and remember the more than 100,000 of our fellow city residents who died as a result of HIV infection, Manhattan’s Community Board 2 has taken a responsible step in keeping open the prospects for a commemorative park to honor the battle against the epidemic.
As Nathan Riley reports in this issue, CB2 forwarded a resolution to the City Planning Commission recommending that, pending further study, a large basement space in the triangular parcel bordered by Seventh Avenue South, Greenwich Avenue, and 12th Street –– formerly owned by St. Vincent’s Hospital –– be preserved for possible use as an AIDS learning center developed in conjunction with a new public park. The Queer History Alliance, which has brought together leading figures and organizations in the LGBT and AIDS communities, has advanced creative ideas for marrying needed open space with the opportunity to mark the historic role that the shuttered hospital played in the dark, early days of the epidemic. To be sure, QHA, by its admission, came into the public debate over this space late, and its central challenge is to convincingly demonstrate that preserving the learning center space will not compromise the fair expectation that a well-landscaped park with clear sight lines from the street can be created.
