Today Sergey yet again has found something I was completely unaware of… –ed.
By SERGEY KADINSKY
Forgotten New York correspondent
ACROSS the city there are numerous barriers to pedestrian connectivity that require the public to take a longer route between points A and B. On the Bronx River Parkway, the .7-mile drive between Noble Playground and the borough Parks office at the Ranaqua building is only a minute without traffic. The highway runs across the railyard on a viaduct, while bike and pedestrian routes must go around it. If one were to walk between these two points, the map apps suggest that it would take 30 minutes on a roundabout 1.5-mile route.
But on my drive to the office I noted a sidewalk on the northbound shoulder of the highway that could serve as a link between Noble Playground and Bronx Park, reducing the walking distance to ten minutes. I walked the route in search of other items worthy of Forgotten-NY. Relying on Google Earth, I marked this sidewalk as an orange line that provides a direct route for a ten-minute walk rather than 30 minutes as suggested on the apps.
Looking south from Bronx Park we see a fork in the road. The Bronx River Greenway goes left, descending under the highway to East 180th Street station and the West Farms neighborhood. It then continues south to Starlight Park. On the right, the path appears poorly maintained but visible enough to show that it was built for the public.
The path becomes a protected sidewalk that crosses the train yard at an elevation of six stories above the ground. It isn’t the High Line and the view to the northeast offers few high-rises in a corner of the borough that is less dense and more suburban as it approaches the city line. This viaduct opened in 1951, when the Bronx River Parkway was extended south of Burke Avenue to terminate near Soundview Park. There were plans to extend it further south, as mentioned in my Clason Point essay.
The Unionport Yard is where the 2 and 5 trains diverge on their way north. The former rises as an elevated line above White Plains Road, terminating at Wakefield; while the latter travels on a repurposed railroad line to Dyre Avenue in Eastchester.
Morris Park Avenue begins near this viaduct, a two-mile run between West Farms at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Between these points is the historically Italian Morris Park neighborhood. Aiming for the eyes of motorists, there is a fading mural ad for Rep. Paul Fino, who represented this section of the Bronx between 1953 and 1968. Our contributing writer Gary Fonville first identified this ad in 2012. A decade later it is still very legible. Also visible here is John Calandra’s name, who was a State Senator from 1966 to 1986. A champion of Italian-American culture, his name appears in CUNY’s John D. Calandra Italian American Institute, Public School 14 co-named the John D. Calandra School, and Bronx Terrace in Yonkers which was co-named for him in 1986 but those signs are gone.
Another railroad that runs under the viaduct is the Amtrak Northeast Corridor that will soon include Metro North service to Penn Station. Two tracks to the left are used by Amtrak and the third track is used by freight trains to access the yards in the Bronx, Queens, and Brooklyn. The right-of-way here has the width to accommodate additional tracks.
The viaduct ends on the other side of the tracks, where the newest visual item is the exit sign for Sheridan Boulevard. Designed as Interstate 895, it was supposed to connect the Bruckner Expressway with the Cross Bronx Expressway, Bronx River Parkway, and then run northeast to link with the New England Thruway. Community opposition resulted in only 1.2 miles of it being completed. In 2017, it was downgraded into a state route and converted into a boulevard. Its namesake is Arthur V. Sheridan, an engineer who served as the Bronx Borough Commissioner of Public Works from 1952 until his death in a car crash a decade later. The proud public servant was buried at Woodlawn Cemetery, in the borough where he worked.
Noble Playground is found at the southern end of this secret walkway. This park was completed in 1939 in tandem with the parkway, rather than the expressway that was built two decades later. According to Bronx street historian John McNamara, this park and the adjoining Noble Avenue were likely named after Alfred Noble, a city engineer in the 1880s.
Returning north to Ranaqua, it is easy to miss this hidden walkway as the sidewalk ends and a metal barrier blocks further passage.
The walkway on the viaduct is on the east side of the road, while Manhattan and the former administration building of the New York, Westchester & Boston Railway that is today’s East 180th Street station, are on the opposite side. The building is a designated city landmark.
Forgive the glare of the sun as I passed by the Ranaqua building in the morning. Its story began in the 1930s when it was one of many public works projects across the city. Each of the boroughs has a Borough Parks Commissioner based inside an iconic building. The Queens commissioner has a desk in the Overlook in Forest Park; Brooklyn is based at Litchfield Villa in Prospect Park, and Staten Island has Stonehenge at Clove Lakes Park. The Manhattan commissioner has the least parklike office- Arsenal West, a nondescript tower a block west of Central Park. The citywide Parks Commissioner’s desk is at the Arsenal in Central Park on Fifth Avenue.
Its design is simple, no elaborate mosaics or sculptures here. A recent feature here is the green rooftop, a miniature grassland on top of the garage. The largest green roof in the city’s parks is on Randall’s Island at its Five Borough Shop where vehicles are repaired.
Another building in this section of the park next to Ranaqua is the police station that serves the highway patrol. Looking north, the Bronx River Greenway continues its way through the park to the city line and beyond. Bronx River Parkway also goes in the same direction into the heart of Westchester County.
Sergey Kadinsky is the author of Hidden Waters of New York City: A History and Guide to 101 Forgotten Lakes, Ponds, Creeks, and Streams in the Five Boroughs (2016, Countryman Press) and the webmaster of Hidden Waters Blog.
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10/21/21