In 1968, Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller succeeded in securing the establishment of the New York State Urban Development Corporation (UDC), with Edward J. Logue as its chief executive officer. Of the many projects initiated during his tenure in that position, Logue considered the development of Roosevelt Island the most significant. On that island, in the middle of New York City’s East River, he attempted to realize his vision of an ideal urban community. Although there were challenges to overcome and compromises to be made, Roosevelt Island is today one of the city’s most desirable residential communities.
Annmarie H. Walsh, The Public’s Business: The Politics and Practices of Government Corporations (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1978), 266.
2.
New York State Urban Development Corporation, Annual Report, 1969 ( New York: New York State Urban Development Corporation , 1970), 13.
3.
New York Times, February 28, 1968.
4.
Ibid.
5.
Ibid., 10 April 1968; Eleanor L. Brilliant, The Urban Development Corporation: Private Interests and Public Authority (Lexington, MA: Lexington Books, D.C. Heath, 1975), 3.
6.
New York Times, April 11, 1968.
7.
Edward J. Logue, interview by author, tape recording, New York, NY, December 13, 1983; James E. Underwood and William J. Daniels, Governor Rockefeller in New York: The Apex of Pragmatic Liberalism in the United States ( Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1982 ), 137.
8.
Edward J. Logue, interview by author, tape recording, Lincoln, MA, February 4, 1985; Joseph E. Persico, The Imperial Rockefeller: A Biography of Nelson A. Rockefeller (New York: Simon & Schuster, c. 1982), 112-13.
9.
For more detail on Logue’s work in New Haven see: Allan R. Talbot, The Mayor’s Game: Richard Lee of New Haven and the Politics of Change ( New York: Harper & Row, 1967 ).
10.
Logue, interview, December 13, 1983.
11.
Lawrence W. Kennedy, Planning the City upon a Hill: Boston since 1630 (Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 1992), 173.
12.
Ibid., 250-51.
13.
Louis K.Loewenstein, The New York State Urban Development Corporation: Private Benefits and Public Costs: An Evaluation of a Noble Experiment ( Washington, DC: Council of State Planning Agencies , 1980), 25.
14.
UDC, Annual Report, 1969, 3.
15.
Ibid.
16.
New York State Urban Development Corporation, Annual Report, 1974 (New York: New York State Urban Development Corporation, 1975), 44.
17.
Institute of Public Administration, New York , ‘‘Let There Be Commitment’’: A Housing Planning Development Program for New York City ( New York: Institute of Public Administration, 1966), iii.
18.
Institute of Public Administration, ‘‘Let There Be Commitment,’’38, 49.
19.
Logue, interview, tape recording, December 13, 1983.
20.
Edward J. Logue, interview by author, tape recording, Lincoln, MA, March 3, 1986.
21.
New York Times, May 22, 1969.
22.
Logue, interview, February 4, 1985.
23.
Edward J. Logue, interview by author, tape recording, Lincoln, MA, March 3, 1986.
24.
Ellen Fletcher , ‘‘Roosevelt Island,’’ in The Encyclopedia of New York City, ed. Kenneth T. Jackson (New Haven and New York: Yale University Press and The New York Historical Society, 1995), 1020-21.
25.
New York Times, August 21, 1973.
26.
Brilliant, Urban Development Corporation, 77.
27.
Edward J. Logue, interview by author, tape recording, Lincoln, MA, October 31, 1986.
28.
New York Times, October 7, 1970.
29.
Philip Johnson and John Burgee, The Island Nobody Knows (New York, 1969 ), 15.
30.
Ibid., 9.
31.
Ibid., 15.
32.
New York State Urban Development Corporation, Annual Report, 1972 ( New York: New York State Urban Development Corporation , 1973), 18.
33.
Johnson and Burgee, Island, 15.
34.
Ibid., 15-16; New York State Urban Development Corporation , Annual Report, 1970 (New York: New York State Urban Development Corporation, 1971), 59.
35.
Johnson and Burgee, Island, 9.
36.
Logue, interview, October 31, 1986.
37.
New York State Urban Development Corporation, Annual Report, 1970 (New York: New York State Urban Development Corporation, 1971), 58.
38.
Logue, interview, October 31, 1986.
39.
Edward J. Logue to Hon. Percy Sutton, 24 July 1970, copy in Edward Joseph Logue Papers, Yale University Library, New Haven, CT. Similar letters were sent to other board members.
40.
New York Times, October 25, 1970.
41.
Logue, interview, October 31, 1986.
42.
Ibid.
43.
Adam Yarmolinsky to Benno C. Schmidt, February 14, 1972, copy in Logue Papers.
44.
Richard Ravitch, interview by author, digital recording, Albany, NY, March 15, 2010.
45.
Logue, interview, October 31, 1986.
46.
New York Times, June 4, 1972.
47.
Logue, interview, October 31, 1986.
48.
Logue, interview, March 3, 1986.
49.
Memorandum, Edward J. Logue to Robert M. Litke, May 10, 1972, copy in Logue Papers.
50.
Robert M. Litke to Edward J. Logue, May 11, 1972, ibid.
51.
Logue to Litke, August 3, 1973, ibid.
52.
Logue to Benno C. Schmidt, October 23, 1973, copy in ibid.
53.
New York Times, May 23, 1971.
54.
Logue, interview, October 31, 1986.
55.
UDC, Annual Report, 1969, 35.
56.
Logue, interview, October 31, 1986.
57.
Summary of proposed lease of Welfare Island between the City of New York and the New York State Urban Development Corporation, October 7, 1969 (finalized on 8 October), Logue Papers.
58.
See, for example, Edward J. Logue to William Ronan, April 11, 1974, copy in Logue Papers.
59.
Logue, interview, October 31, 1986.
60.
Logue to Ronan, draft (n.d., but probably October 1972), Logue Papers.
61.
Ronan to Logue, November 28, 1972, ibid.
62.
Logue, interview, October 31, 1986.
63.
New York Times, March 30, 1973.
64.
On March 1, 2010, the tram was shut down for extensive modernization. It is scheduled to be back in operation in September 2010.
65.
Harvey B. Scribner to Robert M. Litke, September 5, 1972, Logue Papers.
66.
Ibid.
67.
Edward J. Logue, interview by author, tape recording, Boston, MA, July 11, 1991.
68.
Edward J. Logue, ‘‘Reflections on Roosevelt Island,’’ unpublished, copy in possession of author.
69.
Ibid.
70.
Logue, interview, July 11, 1991.
71.
Richard L. Koral, President, New York Chapter, American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers, to Milton Musicus, Chairman, Mayor’s Interdepartmental Committee on the Public Utilities, 9 March 1972, copy in Logue Papers.
72.
Report on Electric Heat for Welfare Island, March 23, 1972, copy in Logue Papers.
