A Plan for Renewable Rikers

The bare minimum to start addressing Rikers Island’s horrific legacy is to ensure, as the jails there are closed, that the island’s future uses benefit and respond to the wishes of the people and communities that have been harmed through its long, painful history. After hundreds of conversations with people who have been incarcerated on Rikers and had loved ones there, a consensus emerged: use the island for green infrastructure through the Renewable Rikers plan. By transferring the island from the control of the Department of Correction to other agencies for green infrastructure uses as outlined in the three laws passed by the City Council in 2021, New York City can further solidify the end of the Rikers Island jail complex.

Retiring and replacing these facilities with solar energy, battery storage, and a consolidated wastewater treatment plant on Rikers would liberate large swathes of waterfront property for communities to redevelop according to their own needs and priorities—and eliminate severe health risks. A third use proposed in the Renewable Rikers plan is food scrap and yard waste recycling. The proximity of three marine waste transfer stations make Rikers Island ideally situated to become a hub for organics processing, relieving nearby communities from burdensome truck traffic and reducing the volume of waste sent to distant municipalities.

The Renewable Rikers plan is an important investment for the City as a whole to meet its ambitious decarbonization goals, while serving as a model for a climate transition rooted in redistributive justice and shared community leadership. Beyond phasing out nearby polluting infrastructure, a research and training institute will enable front-line communities to gain education and skills in green occupations using the island as a testing ground for innovative technological and pedagogical approaches.

Few things could mark the end of the Rikers Island penal colony more definitively than transferring the land for positive use. The plan presented here is admittedly a long-term vision that will require continuous input from communities most impacted by Rikers and sustained activism from a broad coalition of New Yorkers. It will likely take generations to repair the harm Rikers has done to Black, Brown, and poor New Yorkers, but we need to start somewhere. The opportunity to use over 400 acres for the benefit of communities that have borne the brunt of mass criminalization, environmental burdens, and disinvestment is both rare and extraordinary.

As part of its 2022 Richard Kaplan Fellowship, RPA commissioned a visioning of what the design of a Renewable Rikers island would look. This design is based on the vision of the Renewable Rikers coalition, please view the full report to learn more.