Hell’s Kitchen Park has become the latest frontline in the neighborhood’s war on rats. Volunteer gardeners and neighbors say the rodent problem has worsened in recent months, despite repeated calls to the Parks Department for extermination.
A rat peeks out of a burrow in Hell’s Kitchen Park. Photo: Lisa Preston
“It’s not enough to call and hope someone shows up,” said longtime gardener Tom Cayler, who is pushing for a structured response plan. “We want weekly exterminations for a month, then monthly treatments, so this problem can finally be brought under control.” Tom added that exterminators only appeared in the park after news of upcoming meetings — and without notice to gardeners, who could point out active burrows.
Fellow gardener Lisa Preston described seeing a dozen rats emerge from holes in her plot during a recent visit. “A few of my holes were covered, but there are several still open,” she said, noting that rat burrows now dot much of the planted area.
Rats scurrying about in Hell’s Kitchen Park’s garden areas. Photos: Lisa Preston
Jim Harker, another gardener, said he recently hand-drew a map of all the active rat burrows in the park and shared it with the Parks Department. “We use shovels to collapse the burrows and stomp on the dirt to just close them in,” he explained. “The idea is to stress the rats and make them have fewer babies.
“We’ve used mint oil on rags, stuffed them in the holes, then sealed them up because they don’t like mint. We’ve also spent the money to get dry ice (from United City Ice, of course) and gravel to suffocate the rats in the burrow — that worked for almost three weeks before they were back.”
Jim Harker’s hand-drawn map of the rat burrows in Hell’s Kitchen Park. Photo: Catie Savage
The gardeners say each member of their group of six volunteers approaches the problem differently, but they coordinate closely with Parks staff, who maintain the grounds daily. “The maintenance staff are really good about picking up trash every day,” Jim said. “They take care of the park and come by every day, and we really appreciate their work.” Still, he noted that rat control falls outside the scope of their role. “The best we can do as volunteers is try to make the burrows inhospitable and push the rats out until the city takes stronger action.”
Neighbor and gardener Uyen Le pointed to food waste and pigeon feeding as key contributors. “A lot of people have the good intention that food is compost, so they throw it in here, but the rats get to it,” she said. “And the pigeon issue — people feed pigeons everywhere in the park, and whatever is left, if it’s not dry, it’s wet. Jim has to clean up so much wet food.”
Uyen Le and Jim Harker discussing the various methods they have tried to tackle the rats. Photo: Catie Savage
Residents who live nearby say the infestation doesn’t stop at the park’s fence line. “Hell’s Kitchen Park has become infested with rats and they’re spreading out to neighboring buildings, including ours,” said Nicolae Rita, who lives on W48th Street and often walks his dog past the park at night. “People in the neighborhood constantly feed pigeons with rice, cooked food and bread. But in reality, they’re feeding the rats. All the efforts we make as a building are in vain since the neighborhood is rat-infested.”
The link between pigeon feeding and rat populations isn’t unique to Hell’s Kitchen. Uptown, residents at the Broadway Mall on West 96th Street have sounded alarms about a similar “rat buffet” created by daily pigeon feeders, according to reporting from West Side Rag. City officials there acknowledged that while it is not illegal to feed pigeons, the practice directly contributes to rat infestations.
Jim and Uyen show W42ST some of the rat burrows and the decomposed remnants of a dead rat. Photos: Catie Savage
The Parks Department has made progress on other cleanliness measures. Citywide inspection data shows a 34% decrease in reported park “filth” issues — from graffiti to medical waste — since 2022. But those metrics don’t track rodents, and residents say rat infestations are becoming a defining quality-of-life challenge.
This week, gardeners and neighbors plan to press the issue directly. On Monday, they will walk the park with Parks Department staff and local officials to highlight the problem firsthand. Later in the week, the rat issue will be on the agenda at Manhattan Community Board 4’s Waterfront, Parks and Environment committee meeting. For the volunteer gardeners, the goal is a clear — a publicly stated extermination schedule so the community can finally get ahead of the vermin.
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