Saving Jamaica Bay

Despite its natural beauty, rich history, and immense resources, Jamaica Bay was New York City’s dumping ground for decades. Towering landfills created landscapes of garbage. Abandoned boats, piers and docks added to the eyesore – not to mention the occasional gangland hit victim. Jets scream overhead constantly as they take off and land at JFK. Four sewage treatment plants discharge into Jamaica Bay. And now there are plans to fill in hundreds of acres of the bay to build the runways needed to handle future air traffic increases at the airport. Saving Jamaica Bay tells how the Bay’s neighbors – residents of working-class Brooklyn and Queens neighborhoods – have developed and nurtured a close relationship with the body of water that has defined, provided for and, most recently, threatened their lives and livelihoods. In the process of rediscovering their historical relationship to the water and natural habitats of Jamaica Bay, residents have been transformed into urban environmentalists struggling to preserve this priceless resource... and their way of life.