To the Editor:

After reading Michael Kimmelman’s fair and balanced Critic’s Notebook article about the Newark Ironbound’s new Riverfront Park (“Newark Revival Wears Orange Along the River,” front page, July 21), I feel compelled to share.

My partner and I are two creative, non-millionaire New Yorkers (a proofreader and a bookkeeper) who, in 2009, driven away from the city by unreasonable real estate prices, were looking to buy a single-family home in a quiet and safe, bike-friendly area, with a guest room, a basement office, two baths and a backyard for a vegetable garden and our four cats (we are New Yorkers, after all).

We found it and more in the Ironbound.

Even though I miss Brooklyn, we find that the Ironbound, and Newark in general, satisfies our quality-of-life needs in many ways. I regularly bike along the riverfront and find it a tranquil space of quiet and cool, despite the orange boardwalk.

STEPHEN BRACCO

Newark, July 21, 2013

To the Editor:

The Passaic River has a toxic legacy that is being addressed by state and federal environmental agencies. Urban rivers, once undervalued and now considered major assets to communities, are a priority for the Environmental Protection Agency.