PS&S was instrumental in designing the Yonkers Saw Mill River Daylighting Park, which helped return The Saw Mill River in Yonkers, New York, to a more natural, open-air condition as part of a park that ran through the center of the downtown. — Courtesy: PS&S
By Joshua Burd
A signature project by PS&S, the Warren-based professional services firm, is garnering new recognition in the latest issue of National Geographic magazine.
The publication this month is featuring the Yonkers Saw Mill River Daylighting Park in Yonkers, New York, which PS&S was instrumental in creating a decade ago, as part of an article highlighting only four parks nationwide. The project centered on the eponymous river, previously buried beneath the city of Yonkers, and a plan to return it to a more natural, open-air condition as part of a park that ran through the center of the downtown with two dynamic pools and three strategic low waterfalls.
PS&S led a team to create the new urban river, which also provided community and ecological benefits and helped advance the municipality’s push for social and economic progress, as detailed in the article titled “America the Beautiful: New ideas for protecting land, water and wildlife.”
“After native plants were installed along the new channel, wildlife appeared as if by magic,” the article states, according to PS&S. “Muskrat, herons, turtles and ducks are spotted here regularly.”
As the architecture, engineering, surveying and environmental consulting firm noted, its design also included a fish ladder that supports the American eel migration, an outdoor learning enclave and a hydro-electric water wheel that powers streetlights near City Hall.
“This was a true conservation project that has resulted in a win-win for the environment as well as for the community economically,” said John Sartor, CEO and president of to PS&S. “We are proud to have helped create such a visionary project that included so many local, state and federal entities to make this a reality.”
