By Sean Wenzel
“It’s like a war zone,” said a man sitting with his poodle.
“I just hope it’s done in my lifetime,” another called out while passing by.
The remarks came on September 19, when West Side Rag visited the northern Upper West Side portion of Riverside Park, from 108th to 116th streets, which is currently in the midst of the Riverside Park Drainage System Reconstruction Project.
We asked locals how they are managing the disruptions connected to the work and how they thought the construction was going. WSR last reported on the $26 million renovations in December of 2025. At the time, construction was one month underway. The goal of the project is to ease the flooding issues that have plagued the area for years.
Since the Rag covered the Riverside Park renovations last December, the estimated completion date for the project has been pushed back from April to May 2027 due to permit filing delays, according to a New York City Parks Department spokesperson.
If you walk on Riverside Drive along this stretch, you’re met with fencing, heaps of debris, construction equipment, and strewn caution tape.
The Parks Department has divided the construction project connected to Riverside Park from 108th to 116th streets into three distinct phases and paths.
Phase One of construction closed the upper path of the park, from 108th to 116th streets, which is directly below the west side of Riverside Drive within the park. There are posters in that stretch that state Phase One began last winter and ended this summer, but locals say otherwise.
“It’s been like this for the summer, but recently the closures moved all the way down,” two kids, pointing toward 108th Street, told the Rag.
Because the upper path in this stretch is closed off, the Parks Department has closed staircase entryways throughout this set of blocks.
However, WSR observed multiple people cutting through the barricades and sneaking through the fences to access the supposedly closed park entryways.
“I think I’m a bit past that,” an elderly woman joked when observing kids shimmying through a gap in the construction to make it to the staircase.
There is a laminated sheet near the 108th Street stair closure that says it would last “approximately three weeks.”
The sign is dated April 26.
22 weeks ago.
On September 21, though, the city placed a new sign near the staircase stating the closure would last until October 1. The Parks Department added that these staircase closures are “to allow for drainage reconstruction prior to the repaving of the asphalt paths.”
Next comes Phase Two of the project, which covers the Riverside Drive pedestrian path from 108th to 116th streets.
Posters along this stretch state that Phase Two will last from the spring of 2026 through the winter of 2027. However, this contradicts the end date for the entire Riverside Park Drainage System Reconstruction project, as stated on the Parks Department official online tracker for the project, as May 2027.
When asked about this discrepancy, the Riverside Park Conservancy referred the Rag to the Parks Department.
A spokesperson from the Parks Department told the Rag that the extension of the project’s end date was “to address grading and drainage issues, additional drainage structures, asphalt pavers, granite block, and expanded tree pits,” along with new work related to concrete curbs and sinkhole restoration work.
While no official disruptions for pedestrians were originally listed for Phase Two of the project, the Parks Department recently closed the Riverside Drive pathway closest to the park from 108th to 111th streets until next spring.
The closure of the pathway has caused people to make their way onto the grassy outskirts of the area to proceed along the stretch.
Lastly, Phase Three is connected to the lower-level path within Riverside Park from 108th to 116th streets. This closure is expected to begin this fall and last until Spring 2027. A buildup of pipes, concrete, and trailers is beginning to form in the area.
Multiple people the Rag spoke to expressed relief in seeing the chronic flooding in Riverside Park addressed, but still hoped for greater clarity from the city.
“I figured it was for the drainage, but I didn’t really have any idea what they were doing,” Richard Mooney, an Upper West Side artist, told the Rag while painting a pile of downed branches.
“I’m just glad they’re doing it,” Ken Doherty, who was standing next to Mooney, added, while also mentioning that the flooding has gotten worse in the last 20 years.
Ralph Pochoda, a 48-year resident of the Upper West Side, wanted the city to be more proactive with its updates about the Riverside Park construction.
“They have these posters, but they don’t update them,” he said. “I wish there were more.”
A Parks Department spokesperson told the Rag that the agency plans to add four new construction signs in the near future with updated information about the drainage and reconstruction project from 108th to 116 streets.
Columbia University student Iris Pope was perplexed at the sight of a pile of benches, “I saw the pile, and I was like, what are we doing here.”
Pochoda, though, remained overall grateful for the work.
“The park wouldn’t survive without it,” he stated plainly.
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Inconvenient and unsightly, but very necessary. It will be worth it in the long run.