Activism Center at Wetlands Preserve

Stop New York City Municipal Rainforest Wood Use!

New York City is the largest municipal user of tropical rainforest wood in North America, destroying rainforests for benches, bridges, boardwalks, and piers. Rainforest Relief and Wetlands are working to stop rainforest wood use by New York City's Department of Parks and Recreation, the largest tropical hardwood consuming municipal agency in North America, and by NYC's Department of Transportation, which uses rainforest wood for pilings and piers and for the pedestrian/bicycle deck over the Brooklyn Bridge.

Coney Island's Boardwalk, pictured at left, is constructed of the tropical rainforest wood ipe (pronounced (ee-pay). In the background is the Steeplechase Park parachute jump ride, where Rainforeest Relief activists dropped a banner in 1998.

In August 1998 Rainforest Relief, with the active support of Wetlands and the Federal Lands Action Group, hung a 125 foot banner from the 245 foot parachute jump in Coney Island's old Steeplechase Park, pictured at right prior to the action. This year, we have held numerous demonstrations and leaflettings on the Brooklyn Bridge to protest the use of rainforest wood in walkway reconstruction. We intend to keep the pressure up on NYC until it stops using unsustainable rainforest wood!

What You Can Do:
Contact Henry Stern, Commisioner of the New York City Dept. of Parks and Recreation, and demand that he end the use of tropical hardwoods in Parks projects unless they are certified by an independent organization approved by the Forest Stewardship Council

Adrian Benepe
Commissioner Department of Parks & Recreation
The Arsenal, Central Park
830 5th Avenue
New York, NY 10021
(800) 201-PARK

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