Going Coastal Good Tidings!

As the year draws to a close, we want to wish you all the very best this holiday season and for the new year ahead! It has been a very productive year. We were able to make great strides in our mission of raising awareness and understanding of the immense value and responsible use of New York City’s coastal resources.   Through the efforts of our volunteers and information initiatives, we encourage adults and children to appreciate, enjoy, and preserve it. Waterfront access equity, water pollution prevention, maritime heritage preservation, and resource conservation are program cornerstones.            

•  A small, all-volunteer organization, Going Coastal is highly effective for its size, implementing a steady stream of valuable programs in 2007:
•  ·    Our Maritime NY Map is useful to anyone interested in New York’s maritime cultural heritage. The online exhibition encourages exploration and understanding of the City’s nautical past and invites users to contribute historical facts and add new structures and sites of historical significance through the Maritime NY Forum. The map complements our continuous Maritime New York free web resources, which now includes the full text of the WPA’s “A Maritime History of New York .”   
• With our Clean Marina Partnership we work with boaters, marinas and yacht club operations to solve the problem of pollutants stemming from marine facilities. As part of this effort, we were joined by the NY Academy of Science Harbor Project to conduct surveys on current recycling practices at Brooklyn marina operations.
• We partnered with Partnerships for Parks, NY-NJ Harbor Estuary Program, NY Marine Trades Association and NYC Parks Marina Division to produce a Clean Marina Directory informing operators about cost effective “green” practices they can easily adopt and complemented it with an online listserv:  Clean Marina Community.
• Happily, we have been awarded grants from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation and BoatU.S. Foundation to expand the Clean Marina Partnership and develop a monofilament fishing line recycling program in the coming year.
• To date, 150,000 visiting and resident pleasure boaters have learned about marine sanitation regulations, free pumpout facilities and no discharge zones located in New York Harbor from our NYC Clean Boating Map. This program also improves with the addition of the Long Island Clean Boating Map just in time for the ‘08 boating season.    
• Our Manhattan Circumnavigation Paddling Safety Map provides essential information for paddlers to approach New York City waters safely and responsibly. The map is distributed for free to hundreds of kayakers each year.
• NYC Water Trail Project is an ongoing partnership to enhance opportunities for recreation and water access by mapping legal launch sites for human-powered watercraft. Going Coastal is producing a waterproof map of the water trail that will be available spring 2008.  
• The NPS Rivers, Trails and Conservation Assistance Program has awarded technical support for us to expand our water trail programs by focusing on a Jamaica Bay Water Trail initiative.
• Going Coastal New York City, the expanded 2^nd edition of our popular shoreline guidebook to all things water-related in NYC releases late spring. Going Coastal Boston and Going Coastal Baltimore are currently in production.
• We introduced Going Coastal’s Book List & Suggested Reading a semi-annual online feature specializing in information about nonfiction books covering maritime themes, waterfront issues, history, science, environment, and discovery. See Norman Brown’s review of maritime titles and the maritime picks of Nicholas Basbane, a former Naval Officer and America’s preeminent bibliophile .
• Our archive of NYC waterfront news reaches thousands of viewers each week through our Going Coasstal Blog at http://goingcoastal.wordpress.com, while Going Coastal TV just got underway on YouTube.

We are always looking for support and partnership opportunities from the greater community. Our programs and publishing activities grow and thrive with your donations. There are many ways you can become involved in our initiatives to raise awareness of urban coastal resources: · Register on the Maritime NY Forum and share your expertise about our maritime heritage. · Suggest a new title for our Book Showcase · Join the NY Clean Marina Partnership and enlist to have a free fishing line recycling station installed at a marina, fishing pier or park location. · Visit us at Booth 42 at the New York National Boat Show.  We thank you for considering supporting our programs.

Happy Holidays!          

Barbara LaRocco, President         

 Zhennya Slootskin, Vice President          

GOING COASTAL, INC. www.goingcoastal.org           

SUPPORTERS: National Fish & Wildlife Foundation, I Love New York, New York Council for the Humanities, New York State Environmental Facilities Corporation, Partnerships for Parks, NY-NJ Harbor Estuary Program, New York Marina Trades Association, National Safe Boating Council, Dometic Sanitation, NYC Dept. of Environmental Protection, NYC Parks & Recreation, Fund for the City of New York, ESRI, U.S. Coast Guard, USCG Auxiliary, U.S. Power Squadron, Google, Ocean Conservancy, B & I Slootskin, West Marine, NPS Rivers, Trails & Conservation Assistance Program, and BoatU.S. Foundation.