Through many years of advocacy, we’ve found that one of the major hurdles our neighbors have to enjoying the greenway is wayfinding. Over the past year we’ve worked with four very talented urban designers and their former professor to create a map of the greenway.

The goal of the project is to illustrate a future for an accessible and continuous Eastern Queens Greenway by combining urban research with the design and the production of a map, a pamphlet and a digital story map. The materials produced create a cognitive image of the route, demonstrate its potential and set the stage for potential physical improvements along the EQGW. If you’d like to improve the greenway, sign our petition.

To gather information on the route, the design team combed over historic and contemporary maps, studied ecological information, conducted multiple site visits and spoke to local politicians Nily Rozic and John Liu (longtime supporters of the greenway upgrades). By pulling this information together, they’ve created something that will be useful to everyone, no matter how well they know the greenway. In addition to the digital map pictured below, they have also created printed maps, which we will distribute along the route and through our partners. These maps were generously printed by Transportation Alternatives, a consistent partner for safer routes in Eastern Queens. We hope you download this copy and pick up a print version along the trail. We hope to see you there!

The design team have recently graduated from the Architecture and Urban Design Master’s Program at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture Planning & Preservation (GSAPP) and were mentored by Sagi Golan, Senior Lead Urban Designer at the NYC Department of City Planning & Adjunct Professor of Urban Design at GSAPP, who provided professional guidance & expertise.

Einat Lubliner is an Architect and Urban Designer currently working at BIG. She received her M.Sc. in Architecture and Urban Design at Columbia University GSAPP, where her main focus was working through different scales, exploring city systems and incorporating social and ecological aspects in the design process of public spaces. She received her B.Arch from the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, and participated in an exchange program at TU Delft in the Netherlands. Moving between cities and exploring different realities and challenges is a major part of developing her agenda as an Architect and Urbanist.

Kunal Mokasdar is an Architect and Urban Designer. He graduated from the Architecture and Urban Design program at GSAPP, Columbia University. Coming from an Architectural background, he has experience working on collaborative and built projects addressing various design domains. As an Urban designer he aspires to integrate these built forms with the public realm. Kunal honed his computational design skills through practice and as a tutor at Mumbai University, and he likes to test new representational techniques as a medium to evoke sustainable change. 

Sharvari Raje is a graduate from the Architecture and Urban Design program at Columbia University GSAPP, before which she received a professional degree in Architecture from NMIMS’ Balwant Sheth School of Architecture, Mumbai. Sharvari is passionate about equitable urban development and invests in dissecting systemic exclusionary practices by working with communities on a grassroots level. She also works with urban spatial data for reporting and journalism, using storytelling as a tool for advocacy.

Tal Fuerst is a graduate of the Master of Science in Architecture and Urban Design program at Columbia University and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Architecture from Tel Aviv University. She is currently working at Scape. She is a recipient of the Lucille Smyser Lowenfish Memorial Prize at the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation at Columbia University. As an experienced Architect and Urban Designer, she practiced and managed a wide range of projects in various scales. In her work, she strives to integrate intangible social factors in decision making and design processes through engagement with communities and stakeholders. 

Sagi Golan is the Senior Lead Urban Designer for Brooklyn at the New York City Department of City Planning (NYCDCP), where he ensures a high level of design excellence in projects across the Borough of Brooklyn. Sagi works on large-scale housing projects, neighborhood planning initiatives, waterfront open spaces, redesigning streets, public spaces, and mixed-use developments. Sagi is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation (GSAPP) and The New School. Sagi holds a Bachelor‘s degree in architecture from Tel Aviv University and an M.S. in Architecture and Urban Design from Columbia University. He is the recipient of the GSAPP award for excellence, the Lucille Smyser Lowenfish Memorial Prize, the 2015 AIANY Urban Design Merit Award and the Michael Weil award for excellence in urban design in the public sector. 

The dedication this team has shown to the greenway has been amazing. By bringing their skills to Eastern Queens, they’ve been able to help show people the grandeur of what our park system has to offer, encouraging us all to explore a little further. We appreciate all the time we’ve worked with them and look forward to seeing the amazing work they continue to create over their careers.