NEWS: On April 24, 2013, PortSide NewYork won a White House award “Champions of Change” for our hurricane Sandy recovery work, from saving the tanker MARY A. WHALEN to helping the Red Hook community ashore.

Our Director Carolina Salguero will receive a National Maritime Historical Society "New York Harbor Historic Ship Steward Award of Excellence" on May 19, 2013 for her work on behalf of the MARY A. WHALEN.

Tuesday 5/21/13, her 75th Birthday! Public Open House! Pier 11 Atlantic Basin, Red Hook, 1-7pm with "Cake and remarks" 5-7pm. Details

PortSide NewYork is a non-profit based in Red Hook, Brooklyn, that delivers a diverse mix of innovative programs relating to water issues, waterfront history and contemporary events. We integrate the working waterfront (past, present and future), maritime preservation, visiting vessels and boating events, arts programs, community revitalization, advocacy and more.

We are fun; we are serious. What unifies our programs is our commitment to helping NYC make better use of its extraordinary “BlueSpace,” the water part of the waterfront.

“PortSide works with both the community ashore and the community afloat.

Our goal is to bring the two closer together.”

Our ambassador and home is a historic ship, the oil tanker MARY A. WHALEN. In October 2012, we succeeded in getting her listed on the National Register of Historic Places. She is the only oil tanker in the world serving as a center for education, cultural events, and advocacy; and she is a floating lesson plan on fuel-consumption and sustainability issues.

While our agenda spans NYC’s entire waterfront, we have a particular commitment to Red Hook, where we were founded and where the MARY A. WHALEN is docked (see map at right). Many of our programs are designed to support Red Hook's community revitalization (both to help this area and to provide an example of how waterfront-themed cultural tourism could help other neighborhoods). Post superstorm Sandy, cultural tourism programs like ours, using local history to attract visitors, can be major aids to recovery.

Coming soon to a street near you!

Because we are, for now, located inside the Red Hook Container Terminal, Homeland Security rules limit public access to our tanker and offices aboard. This has had us operate as a cultural “pop-up” while seeking a new home. Finding a “parking place” for a former oil tanker in NYC turns out to be not so simple! However, a solution is now on the horizon: we’re negotiating with GBX▪Gowanus Bay Terminal for a homeport in Red Hook.

At GBX, you would step directly onto the MARY WHALEN's gangway from the Columbia Street sidewalk across from IKEA. And a home at GBX – a vital, industrial facility with a rich history of its own – would be in keeping with PortSide's mission to bring the landside community and working waterfront closer together while creating programs that explore and promote Red Hook’s waterfront past and present.

To learn more about our prospective home, please click here: MARY A. WHALEN FUTURE.

We hope to see you aboard soon!