79th Street (Manhattan)

Description

On the Upper East Side, East 79th Street stretches from East End Avenue, passing the New York Public Library Yorkville Branch to Fifth Avenue. where the entrance to the 79th Street Transverse is flanked by The 79th Street transverse crosses Central Park between Children's Gate at Fifth Avenue, and Hunter's Gate at Central Park West and 81st Street on the Upper West Side. 79th Street does not exist between Central Park West and Columbus Avenue, due to the superblock of Manhattan Square, largely occupied by the American Museum of Natural History. West of Columbus Avenue, 79th Street continues and terminates in Riverside Park at a roundabout directly after the exit/entrance ramps for the Henry Hudson Parkway, under which sit the 79th Street Boat Basin and its cafe.

History

The street was designated by the Commissioners' Plan of 1811 that established the Manhattan street grid as one of 15 east-west streets that would be 100 ft in width (while other streets were designated as 60 ft in width).

The interchange on the Hudson River and the boat basin was first proposed in 1934 and was constructed by 1937 during the tenure of Robert Moses as Parks Commissioner. It was part of the "79th Street Grade Crossing Elimination Structure" which created a grand architectural multi-level entry and exit from the Henry Hudson Parkway while eliminating a grade crossing of the New York Central Railroad's West Side Line by covering it over and creating the Freedom Tunnel. Designed by Gilmore David Clarke, the Works Projects Administration provided $5.1 million for the project, which also included an underground parking garage, a restaurant, and the marina.

In 2025, the New York City Department of Transportation announced plans to spend $60 million upgrading 79th Street to improve service on the M79 SBS crosstown bus route. These modifications included changes to traffic-signal timing and the addition of a bus lane and bus queue-jumps.

Transportation

On the west side, the 79th Street station on the New York City Subway's IRT Broadway–Seventh Avenue Line is located at the intersection of 79th Street and Broadway, it is served by during the daytime and during late nights. The 81st Street-Museum of Natural History station of the IND Eighth Avenue Line is located at 81st Street and Central Park West, and is served by trains that are local at all times.

On the east side, the 77th Street station on the IRT Lexington Avenue Line, two blocks south, is served by during the daytime and during late nights.

The M79 SBS crosstown bus route runs between East End Avenue and Riverside Drive via 79th Street at all times, using the roundabout near the 79th Street Boat Basin to change direction. Eastbound service on the street heads to West 81st Street via Amsterdam Avenue due to Columbus Avenue being a downtown-only corridor, and ends at York Avenue.

Notable locations

• At Broadway stands The Apthorp (Clinton and Russell, architects, 1908), one of the West Side's classic apartment blocks, and the First Baptist Church in the City of New York (George M. Kaiser, architect, 1891).
• Between 6th and 7th Avenues, on the line of West 79th Street as it was drawn through what became Central Park was the south end of the Receiving Reservoir, a vital storage part of the Croton Aqueduct of 1842. Water was piped down from Westchester County, over the Harlem River and down the west side to the Receiving Reservoir, located between 79th and 86th Streets and Sixth and Seventh Avenues in an area then known as Yorkville. The Reservoir was a fortress-like building 1826 ft long and 836 ft wide, and held up to 180 e6USgal of water, 35 e6USgal flowed into it daily from northern Westchester.
• Former mayor Michael Bloomberg lives in a five-story townhouse on East 79th Street, between Madison Avenue and Fifth Avenue. Other notable residents of 79th Street include or have included; Tom Wolfe, Reggie Jackson, Art Garfunkel and Eliot Spitzer. Socialite Nan Kempner lived on 79th Street at Park Avenue.
• The south side of the block between Fifth and Madison is protected as a rare unbroken row of townhouses. It begins at the corner of Fifth with the French Renaissance Harry F. Sinclair House (1897–98), now housing the Ukrainian Institute.
• Four landmarked townhouses exist on the north side of 79th Street between Madison and Park Avenues:
  • 53 East 79th Street (Trowbridge & Livingston, 1916–1918), built for John S. and Catherine Dodge Rogers. It houses the New York Society Library, the city's oldest circulating library, founded in 1754.
  • 59 East 79th Street (Foster, Gade & Graham, 1908–1909), built for John H. and Caroline Iselin
  • 63 East 79th Street (Adams & Warren, 1902–1903), built for Thatcher and Frances Adams
  • 69 East 79th Street (Carrère & Hastings, 1907–1908), built for George and Sarah Rives
• On the street grid, East 79th Street leads to an unnumbered southbound-only entrance to the FDR Drive at East 78th Street. East 79th Street is also the southern end of East End Avenue, which runs north-south to 90th Street.

References

Notes

References

1. "79th Street".
2. [http://maloney.house.gov/index.php?option=com_issues&task=view_issue_detail&issue=291&Itemid=35 10021 Zip Code Split], Representative [[Carolyn Maloney]] press release. Accessed August 1, 2008.
3. (May 19, 1981). "67–69 East 79th Street Building". Landmarks Preservation Commission.
4. "Parish History".
5. [[Gouverneur Morris. Morris, Gouverneur]], [[Simeon De Witt. De Witt, Simeon]], and [[John Rutherfurd. Rutherford, John]] {{sic (March 1811) [https://urbanplanning.library.cornell.edu/DOCS/nyc1811.htm "Remarks Of The Commissioners For Laying Out Streets And Roads In The City Of New York, Under The Act Of April 3, 1807"], [[Cornell University Library]]. Accessed June 27, 2016. "These streets are all sixty feet wide except fifteen, which are one hundred feet wide, viz.: Numbers fourteen, twenty-three, thirty-four, forty-two, fifty-seven, seventy-two, seventy-nine, eighty-six, ninety-six, one hundred and six, one hundred and sixteen, one hundred and twenty-five, one hundred and thirty-five, one hundred and forty-five, and one hundred and fifty-five--the block or space between them being in general about two hundred feet."
6. (June 15, 1934). "West Side Traffic to Run on 4 Levels - Grade Elimination Structure at 79th St. Announced as Part of Park Plan - Motorists to be Aided - Express Highway Will Pass Over Central Tracks With Pedestrian Arcade Below.". [[The New York Times]].
7. "Henry Hudson Parkway".
8. Panza, Bobby. (April 15, 2025). "DOT Unveils Plans for $60 Million Overhaul of 79th Street Transit Corridor".
9. Saltonstall, Gus. (April 16, 2025). "Major Changes Coming to 79th Street Bus Corridor: $60M Project Unveiled".
10. {{NYCS const. map
11. {{Cite NYC bus. M79
12. {{Cite NYC bus map. M
13. Acitelli, Tom. (March 25, 2008). "The Sit-Down:Morrison Heckscher, On the Park". [[The New York Observer]].
14. Jones, Richard Lezin. (November 11, 2001). "Billionaire Next Door Is a Regular Kind of Guy". The New York Times.
15. Arnold, Hallie. (August 31, 2005). "One more drug offense could land Garfunkel in jail". Kingston Daily Freeman.
16. (March 12, 2008). "Spitzer to Resign Soon; Paterson Set as Successor". [[The New York Times]].
17. Haden-Guest, Anthony. (August 12, 2001). "Vanity fare: She is the legendary New York socialite: stick thin, fabulously wealthy and dressed head to toe in couture. Here, Nan Kempner reveals why she hates fat people... but loves high fashion and junk food". [[The Observer]].
18. Gray, Christopher. (October 9, 1998). "The John S. Rogers House".