NEW YORK—The underground park concept Delancey Underground, or the LowLine, became well known last fall for its fresh take on an abandoned underground space. Now its designers are asking the community for support, hoping to “take what is otherwise a very abstract concept … and actually make this thing exist,” said James Ramsey, the man with an underground park vision.

Ramsey, who owns and founded RAAD Studio, an architecture and design firm, also created the key to transforming the underground space: skylights that collect light aboveground, and ferry it underground through fiber-optic cables. On days with low light, or rain, LEDs would supplement the new technology.

The 1.5 acres of vacant space owned by the MTA and formerly used as a trolley stop, is next to the Essex Street J/M/Z subway station on the Lower East Side. 

A video released by the MTA in November shows off the abandoned trolley stop on a tour led by Peter Hine, senior project manager of the MTA’s Real Estate Department. He says it’s a “rather remarkable and unique urban space,” that could work for “any number of commercial uses,” such as a restaurant, a nightclub, or a retail store.

Or, it could be a park.

“From a design standpoint, it is very much our intention to take that very amazing historical shell and not destroy it or disrespect it, but rather to use it—to play it against this science fiction technology and this fantastical insertion … of greenery,” said architect and designer Ramsey.

He, along with co-founder Dan Barasch, gave a presentation about the project at Trespa | Arpa Design Centre New York off Greene Street on Wednesday evening, in an effort to gather community support behind the project.

“We’ve gotten some incredible levels of support from our Councilmember [Margaret Chin]… and we’ve also gotten the [Lower East Side] Business Improvement District to support us, but we have not yet gotten the community board to support us, so we’ll be calling on people to help us in that process, and that will be an important signal to the state and the city that we are serious and we have the community’s support behind us,” said Barasch.