Upper East Side Street Fairs: August-October

Community Board 8 met Monday to discuss the Upper East Side street fairs expected to take place from August through October. The meeting was streamed on Youtube if you want to watch it for some reason. But, here’s what’s (probably) happening. There’s a bit of drama at the end … just saying. Might want to stick it out.

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There’s a Powerpoint presentation which says that “ISF is about promoting Indonesian Culinary, Culture and Tourism in Manhattan.” It’s been held since 2015 (excluding 2020 and 2021) and this year, there will be “16 food booths and 7 non-food booths” and “9 cultural live performances,” which a representative says will include “dancing and a traditional musical performance.”

“This year, we coincide with the 75th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Indonesia and United States,” said Ramulo, a representative from the Indonesian Consulate General NYC. “Indonesia is the fourth [most] populous country in the world, but I think the most invisible big country in the U.S. Nobody knows us except when we mention about Bali island or New Amsterdam. The early name of New York was exchanged by one of our islands back in, I think 200-300 years ago. And [the festival] is all about [promoting] the five senses of sight, sound, smell, touch and taste.”

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Ronald McDonald House New York Block Party
 – East 73rd Street between York Avenue and First Avenue
– Saturday, September 1 from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. 

Caitlin Conklin, the director of volunteers at Ronald McDonald House, did a very good job describing their plans.

“Ronald McDonald House supports families who have a child with pediatric cancer and other serious illnesses. So we are bringing it back to 73rd Street to celebrate the 45 years on on the block, and it is a community. We call it a friend raiser, not a fundraiser, because it is a give back to the community for supporting us throughout the year. So it is totally free to the public. We have rides and games, all free tents. Have different activations, like arts and crafts for the kids. We collaborate with our community partners to host booth as well. So the NYPD comes. They will be bringing their gaming truck as well as their rock climbing wall. The FDNY is looking to bring their smoke truck to do a little smoke teaching session with the kids. We are looking to partner with the New York Rangers to bring some of the Rangers hockey players, since they are wonderful partners of the House, to do some shoot off hockey pucks in the middle of the street. So we’re looking really to just fill the street with some fun filled activations, just to really give back to the community and provide a fun day for our families at Ronald McDonald House. We’re looking for food trucks to come and partner with us and actually donate the food so that it would be free to the public.”

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This is the annual ‘welcome-back’ event for Hunter students.

“By carnival, we mean that we will have popcorn, cotton candy, a caricaturist, airbrushed t-shirts along with food,” said Teneia Wooten, Hunter’s assistant director of Student Activities and Leadership Development. Wooten said they usually have about 900 students who attend. One board member shared some concerns about the amount of construction on the block they’re planning to have this fair on; Wooten just said they’ll set up shop around the construction, as they’ve done in years past.

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Nightingale-Bamford School Homecoming Celebration
 – East 92nd Street between Madison Avenue and Fifth Avenue
– Saturday, September 28 from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. 

“Homecoming is a celebration of our athletes and also a celebration of our Nightingale community,” said Courtney Bymoe, Director of Events and Logisitics at The Nightingale-Bamford School. This is the fourth year they’ll be celebrating on the street, as the school is too small to host all the families and students that come. It’s open to the public and there are typically between 500-700 people who attend. There will be five food trucks. “We do have one food truck who is minority owned and is women owned, but the rest of the food trucks is like our Mr. Softee truck, because, you know, it’s not summer without Mr. Softee.” They’ll also have lawn games like cornhole, a giant Jenga, a giant Connect 4 and more.

Central Park Precinct Community Block Party
 – East 60th Street between Fifth Avenue and Madison Avenue (full street closure)
– Sunday, September 29 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. 

Roger Thomas from the Central Park Precinct Community Council was there to present. He said that in years past most of their vendors have been food trucks but they always try to get local restaurants involved, “but because we’re over by Madison, we haven’t had any luck with getting any of them, because a lot of the stores are over by Lexington, and they don’t want to bring their stuff over that far.”

Proceeds from the event go towards the NYPD’s National Night Out Against Crime, their Harmony Day Picnic, “award ceremonies for the police officers, for when they do good things,” police equipment, and the auxiliary police, which is a “volunteer police unit in Central Park.”

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“We began this in October of 2021, really as a way to physically see each other as we were coming out of Covid,” said Julian Schroeder from the church, adding that they generally get about 300 to 400 people. “I’d say about half of those are children, fairly small children.” He said they’ll have a bouncy house, helium balloons, crafts tables, cotton candy and popcorn.

They’ll have packaged snacks and beverages outside and will be serving hot food inside [at 921 Madison Ave]. “We have a wonderful chef [and] the meal is completely free.”

He shared some photos during his presentation.

Asphalt Screams
 – East 90th Street between East End Avenue and York Avenue
– Friday, October 25 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.. 

This is Asphalt Green’s annual Halloween event which they’ve been hosting for over ten years. They’re now expanding the to the street because the “last event was just under 6,000 people,” according to Syane Clemente, Asphalt Green’s events and rentals manager. “Our plan for this specific street is that we will have carnival games for guests to be able to participate in. Again, it’s an expansion of the event, so anyone that does attend the carnival will be able to enjoy the event that’s happening on the premises as well.”

“Food is going to be on the premises, and food will be available for everyone,” Clemente added. “We have not secured the food vendors yet, but typically, our food vendors are within the Upper East Side Community.”

They’ll also have bouncy houses and inflatables on their field and their spooky house inside the Murphy Center.

One person who lives across the street from Asphalt Green isn’t too happy about the expansion.

“How many people do they anticipate coming? And how many can Asphalt Green accommodate? And why can Asphalt Green not accommodate all the people, like, how many people are coming to this tiny little one block which people live on, which is one way, which we have a garage on? It just sounds like a terrible idea, noisy, inconvenient and long. So I was just wondering, what is Asphalt Green not able to do in their entire giant building, huge outdoor space? Why does this need to spill onto the street?”

Clemente said they’re expecting 10,000 people this year, so they need more space.

The neighbor had a few more things to say.

“It would be nice if more people were made aware and could weigh in who are in this community. Because to me, it sounds like a terrible idea. Honestly, Asphalt Green is a pretty terrible neighbor to begin with. Even last night at 930 p.m. all the lights were on. People were with whistles. There were games going on. It was Sunday night at 930 p.m., like they’re not a particularly respectful, quiet neighbor. So to be bringing 10,000 people, for me as a long time resident, I’ve been here over two decades, it sounds like a terrible, terrible idea, and I think more people would want to weigh in if they had any idea what was being planned for that day.”