Rendering of the four-story school along 2nd Street between 56th and 57th Avenues in Hunters Point. The school will seat students of P.S. 384 in Court Square once completed in 2021. (School Construction Authority)
Jan. 17, 2019 By Nathaly Pesantez
A new school is rising in Long Island City as part of the sprawling Hunters Point South development.
Officials and local parents held a groundbreaking ceremony today for the four-story elementary school long in the works at 2nd Street between 56th and 57th Avenues.
The school, with an address of 1-35 57th Ave., will seat 612 students from pre-kindergarten through the fifth grade, and is expected to open in September 2021.
The state-of-the-art school will be fully air-conditioned and accessible, and includes an outdoor ground level playground. Standard features like a library and “gymnatorium” are also part of the design.
Rendering for Parcels F and G of the Hunters Point South development site. The white block between the two towers represents the upcoming elementary school. (Handel Architects)
Work on the school comes after the School Construction Authority first filed plans with the Department of Buildings for the site in the beginning of 2018.
The school is situated within what is known as “Parcel F,” a vacant lot that makes up one of the seven blocks in the city’s 30-acre Hunters Point South development. The lot is also gearing up to see a large residential tower after developers were officially announced for the project in 2017.
The school marks the third to form part of the development, with one school, the Hunters Point Campus, completed in 2013 and another elementary school underway at 54th Avenue. Further north, the community is served by P.S./I.S. 78.
Elected officials, civic leaders, and local parents at a groundbreaking ceremony for a new elementary school at Hunters Point. (via Council Member Jimmy Van Bramer)
But the school couldn’t come soon enough, as local leaders and parents rejoiced in the groundbreaking and cited current overcrowding in the neighborhood.
“Over the last decade, Long Island City has experienced a building and baby boom, and our community desperately needs more schools to keep up with growth,” said Council Member Jimmy Van Bramer, adding, “This is a great victory for our community, but also just the start.”
The school, once completed in two years time, will immediately seat students of P.S. 384, a new “incubator” school temporarily operating within a Court Square building.
P.S. 384 began accepting kindergarteners in the 2018 school year that would have otherwise gone to the P.S. 78, which was at the brink of capacity.
The arrangement initially called for the overflow of kindergarteners to head to an incubator school in Woodside in an plan that saw massive backlash.
Hunters Point South development (EDC)
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2 Comments
The school is absolutely needed. However, the infrastructure in LIC is at a breaking point. New and longtime residents are furious.
…” says Rick, speaker for all new and longtime residents