As proud residents of Throggs Neck, and owners of The Ice House and Hammond’s Cove Marina, we are extremely sad to announce that our journey here may be coming to an end very soon. After 20 years of blood, sweat, tears, money, and time; the Parks Department has decided not to renew our lease.

Not only were we given less than three weeks notice to gather our possessions and process this devastating news, our efforts to communicate with the Parks Department over the past few months were constantly ignored. We called endlessly to figure out our next steps and ironically, when we finally received an answer, a meaningless VERBAL notice regarding the end of our Woman-Owned Business was left to us on International Women's Day.

Our family is beyond appalled as to the way this life-changing news was communicated to us by the Parks Department, and with such a short amount of time to leave. Although we were always aware of the possibility of the Parks Department ending our business, we believe they gave such short notice, as to strong arm us into having to sell our equipment at a low -ball offer. Again, although we still did not receive official papers, we hope to see you all before April 1st, in case the worst happens.

Our family took over the marina 20 years ago. After running the marina for some years, and meeting customers that made us feel like we were part of a true community, a place we couldn’t be prouder to be a part of! Our journey here has become more than just a business to us. We are so grateful for all of our loyal customers throughout the years. We have celebrated your accomplishments, birthdays, and with some of you, we have even comforted you through your losses. When we originally took over the marina, there was only a small concession stand. We wanted the opportunity to give something special to the neighborhood, and with that, we built the Ice House Restaurant from the ground up, with our own bare hands.

Unfortunately, we now have less than two weeks to try and gather not only our emotions and goodbyes, but also, our literal belongings. We were dismissed with no time to comprehend this major loss to our family. And, as far as we are aware, the Ice House will no longer be run under the new ownership and we are sadly unsure of the future of the restaurant.

Even though we were only given a verbal notice a few short weeks ago, we cannot help but feel that this has been a plan of the city’s for many years. We fought for things to better our marina, such as dredging and FEMA money. We spent countless hours securing finances to better not only the the marina , but the entire community. To our surprise, we recently found out that both the dredging and FEMA money were available for years, but the city has only granted these requests now. The new concessionaire will now reap the benefits of a new gang way, parking lot, new electric, etc....all courtesy of OUR family's hard work.  

To be clear, we are fighting this and had NO intentions of leaving. Running the Ice House and Marina is not just an occupation but, it’s our life, our community, our family. We care about this neighborhood, and we want to thank you ALL for helping us grow this business into a staple of the community. We also would thank our local politicians, Marjorie Velázquez and Nathalia Fernandez. They have been with us through this process, and tried to help the best they could.

We are keeping the faith and hope that our patrons, family, and friends all do the same. We ask that each and every one of you call (and tag on all social media platforms) both the Parks Department and Mayor’s office to let them know how you feel. The best we can do is show how much we care and how passionate we are about keeping the restaurant and marina up and running.

If we have learned anything from moving to Throggs Neck and owning this marina, it’s that we are BRONX STRONG!

Sue Donoghue (Parks Department) 212-360-1305

Parks commissioner at Susan.donoghue@parks.NYC.gov

Please also contact, email, and TAG (on all social media platforms) Mayor Adam’s and his office. 

Tag @nycparks on Instagram and other social platforms.