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NYC Will Spend Nearly $6 Million To Restore World's Fair NY State Pavilion
By
Jen Carlson
Published Jul 8, 2014
Modified Jul 8, 2014
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By
Jen Carlson
Published Jul 8, 2014
Modified Jul 8, 2014
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Photo by Wally G
The New York State Pavilion, one of the few structures from the 1964 World's Fair that's still standing, was landmarked in 2009, but beyond that remained largely ignored. The ghost of the fair's glory days lingers in Flushing Meadows Corona Park to this day, with a small team of preservationists by its side. And now the city has finally budgeted $5.8 million for some much needed restoration work—a bulk of which is coming from the Mayor's office.
According to the NY Times, "The money is a down payment on the rehabilitation of the pavilion and an adjacent structure, the Tent of Tomorrow... The $5.8 million allotment follows two engineering studies commissioned by the parks department to assess its condition." The area also contains the massive Texaco map on terrazzo panels, which has been given Band-Aid treatments in the past.
What took so long? Dorothy Lewandowski, the parks department’s Queens borough commissioner, told the Times, “We realized just how important the Pavilion still is to the public when thousands of visitors lined up for a peek inside as part of the recent World’s Fair anniversaries celebration."
While the Times notes that it's unclear what the money will go towards exactly, a press release from Queens Borough President Melinda Katz states that it "will be used to upgrade the structure's electrical system, rebuild staircases inside the Pavilion's three towers and repair the concrete platforms supporting the observation decks at the top of each of the towers." Sadly, even this won't bring it back to an operational state—that would cost around $52 million. Paging Cats!
Tagged
budget
new york state pavilion
preservation
queens
world's fair
Jen Carlson
Jen Carlson is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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