The daffodils and tulips that come up along Gantry Plaza State Park and Hunter's Point South Park next spring will go into the ground on one Saturday morning, November 7. Volunteers will plant them. The bulbs are donated, the tools are lent, and the group running the day spent October raising the money that keeps the parks programmed. Look at this fall's calendar on the Hunters Point waterfront and most of it is upkeep done in public: replacing dead trees, pulling weeds, a fundraising dinner and a bulb planting. Hunters Point Parks Conservancy runs all of it, and anyone who lives nearby can show up.
One conservancy, two park systems
Most people walking the waterfront treat it as a single park. On paper it's two. Gantry Plaza State Park is a New York State park. Hunter's Point South Park is managed by NYC Parks. Two agencies, two budgets, two sets of rules, along one stretch of shoreline.
Hunters Point Parks Conservancy connects them. It started in 1998 as Friends of Gantry Plaza State Park. In 2014, after Hunter's Point South Park opened in 2013, it widened its mission and took its current name, according to HPPC. HPPC describes its work as programming, environmental education, volunteer stewardship, advocacy and coordination with both the city and state park departments. NYS Parks officially recognizes it as a partner, and HPPC says NYC Parks did the same in 2019.
That split explains why the fall work looks the way it does. HPPC is a partner. It doesn't manage either park. The extra layer it adds on top of agency maintenance, from replacement trees to bulb beds to free classes, depends on whatever money and volunteers it can line up. This October shows where both come from.
The trees going in on Center Boulevard
The season started on Friday, October 9, when HPPC and NYC Parks scheduled the first planting in a plan to add 30 trees to Hunter's Point South Park. The list is mostly about filling gaps. It replaces a dead cherry tree, fills the empty tree pits on Center Boulevard, and swaps out some of the dead birches at the playground on 55th Avenue.
The money shows how much the conservancy does with a little help. HPPC set aside $20,000 for replacement trees this year. The Arbor Day Foundation then offered to pay for 10 trees, which let the conservancy plant considerably more than its own budget allowed. NYC Parks' Tree Time program supported buying and planting the rest. The October 9 session was billed as the first set, with Parks staff on site to guide volunteers who had no experience. If you've walked past bare pits on Center Boulevard, this is the program filling them. It's still underway.
The weeding nobody sees
Trees get a sign-up page. Weeding just happens. HPPC's 2026 schedule runs volunteer gardening every Thursday and Saturday from 10 a.m. to noon, weather permitting, from May 2 through October 30. The conservancy says volunteers fill around 2,000 bags of weeds a year.
Thursday crews meet by the Park House near Center Boulevard and Borden Avenue. Saturday meeting spots go out by email ahead of each session. Everyone has to complete a waiver first, and Saturday volunteers sign HPPC's and New York State Parks' waivers both. That last detail is the two-agency setup showing up in the paperwork. With the season ending October 30, the remaining sessions this year are:
- Thursday, October 15
- Saturday, October 17
- Thursday, October 22
- Saturday, October 24
- Thursday, October 29
The dinner that pays for the free stuff
Tree replacement is one budget line. Programming is a bigger one, and that money comes from a dinner. HPPC holds its annual Waterfront Gala on Wednesday, October 14, from 6 to 9 p.m. at American Brass, with music, dinner, drinks and a silent auction. Tickets at the door are $160; the $130 early-bird price ended September 13. HPPC says all proceeds go to park programming, which lets it offer more than 230 free programs a year.
Put the ticket price next to that program count and the economics are plain. Every free scavenger hunt, art class and bird walk on the waterfront is partly paid for by one night of ticket and auction sales. Last year's gala worked the same way. In September 2025, QNS reported that proceeds would go to park upkeep, free programming, and the Queens Landing Boathouse and Environmental Center.
What that money buys in late October
The free calendar for the rest of the month is the gala's output, and it leans seasonal:
- October 15, Gantry Plaza. NYS Parks lists a tree walk and fall watercolor activity at the state park.
- October 24, 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. HPPC runs Fall Birding with naturalist Gabriel Willow, with registration on Eventbrite.
- October 31, 2 to 8:30 p.m. Halloween on the Waterfront puts a Halloween Fest at the Oval from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m., with a costume parade and contest, then a sunset screening of The Nightmare Before Christmas at about 6:30. HPPC says more details are still to come.
Halloween is the one day the waterfront calendar overlaps with another park. Up the East River, Socrates Sculpture Park holds its Halloween Harvest Festival and season closeout the same Saturday, noon to 5 p.m., free with RSVP. It has family workshops, a community resource fair, the Planted Culture Vegan Food Market, and what the park calls New York's second-largest dog costume contest, co-presented with Chateau le Woof. Socrates wraps up by 5, and the Oval festivities start at 5:30, so one household could do both.
MoMA PS1 adds two indoor dates before then. Its free, all-ages Halloween Family Day runs October 17 from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Online pumpkin-carving registration was full at last check, with limited drop-in spots noted. School Nite on Thursday, October 22, runs 7 to 11 p.m. with Isabella Lovestory, B0YG1RL and ali rq.
Bulbfest, where the spring comes from
Everything above leads up to November 7. HPPC's 12th annual LIC Bulbfest runs 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. that Saturday, and the plan is to plant more than 15,000 bulbs across Gantry Plaza State Park and Hunter's Point South Park. Check-in is at Gantry near 49th Avenue and Center Boulevard. Tools and instructions are provided, and all experience levels are welcome.
The supporter list shows how much of this is donated. The Van Zyverden company is donating the bulbs. The New York City Green Fund, Con Edison, Council Member Julie Won, State Senator Kristen Gonzalez, Assembly Member Claire Valdez and DYCD are credited as supporters. This is also the one event that crosses the state-city line on purpose. A single crew plants both parks in one morning.
Fifteen thousand bulbs is about what HPPC plants every year. In October 2024, ahead of the 10th Bulbfest, QNS reported a target of more than 15,000 bulbs, including daffodils, tulips, alliums, hyacinths and muscari, with 93,000 planted over the previous nine events. By October 2025, the decade total had passed 100,000. That's more than 100,000 bulbs in a decade, nearly all of them planted in a few hours each November.
What the volunteers can't fix
Some changes on the waterfront are bigger than a conservancy can handle, and they run on agency timelines. In March 2026, LICtalk reported that the basketball and tennis/pickleball courts at Gantry's 48th Avenue area would close for a year-long renovation by NYS Parks. If that timeline holds, the courts stay fenced through winter.
The Hunter's Point South ferry landing is next in line, and it's still on paper. NYCEDC's project page puts the replacement landing about 200 feet north of the current one. It targets a final design submission by fall 2026, construction starting in winter 2027, and service by summer or fall 2027, with permitting and environmental review still underway. Those dates are targets. Nothing has been built.
Between those two projects sits a short list of fall jobs a neighbor can actually do, and the last ones start soon. Thursday weeding ends October 29, and the bulbs go in on November 7, starting at the check-in table near 49th Avenue and Center Boulevard.
Living near a waterfront that volunteers and a conservancy maintain is part of what owning in Hunters Point means, and it's part of how the area's buildings are valued. If you're weighing what your Long Island City apartment is worth with the parks and the ferry plans in view, Iryna Ferenets can put numbers to it. Get Your Instant Home Valuation, and we'll talk through what the waterfront adds to your building.
