HENRY HUDSON CLIMATE-ADAPTIVE WATERFRONT PARK
Community driven design for a climate-adaptive waterfront park
Location: Hudson, New York
Client: City of Hudson, New England Interstate Water Pollution Control Commission, New York State Department of Environmental Conservation
Services Provided: Landscape Architecture, Community & Stakeholder Engagement, Resiliency Design & Planning
Collaborators: LaBella Associates, eDesign Dynamics, & youarethecity
Henry Hudson Riverfront Park is an existing 7 acre park situated along the Hudson River. Assemblage has led two phases of the climate-adaptive redesign: Phase 1 (completed 2022) established the community-driven park design, and Phase 2 (2025 completion) conducted investigations, secured approvals, and produced bid documents for implementation.
The park, already subject to seasonal tidal flooding, will be further impacted by sea level rise in the future. The resulting framework plan is adaptive to sea level rise, regenerates the shoreline’s intertidal ecology, and maintains waterfront recreational access that is critical to the Hudson community.
With a projected 54” rise in sea level projected to occur by the year 2080, the design team proposed embrace the advancing water in some areas, and to raise a key part of the shoreline that is most popular with the community. Additionally, moving parking back to the street and away from the shoreline will prioritize pedestrian use of the waterfront.
The design is grounded in a rigorous community engagement process that helped establish the design priorities: new accessible paths, living shorelines in the protected bays, an elevated knoll and fishing pier, new water access points, a nature play area, and a restored woodland and estuarine education space.
Restoring a historic industrial site along the Hudson River
Through community engagement and resiliency planning, we developed a climate-adaptive plan for the park that will protect it’s recreational vitality and ecological viability for years to come.
Once a vibrant marshland, the existing site was reshaped for industrial use before being transformed into the recreational park that exists today.
The climate-adaptive design enhances the remnant shoreline shape through the introduction of a living shoreline that will restore marsh habitat and create a resilient, accessible landscape.
The park’s waterfront is vulnerable to recurrent seasonal flooding, and sea-level rise projections indicate that much of the shoreline will be increasingly affected by 2050. The climate-adaptive design elevates a key area of the park shoreline with a new pier and lawn area.
Our climate-adaptive approach repurposes existing materials. Existing trees have a second life as play features within the natural play area. We consider the full material potential of every site by integrating salvage and reuse into the design process.
The sequence below illustrates our inventory process for reclaiming wood from trees that will be removed as part of shoreline elevation.
