BROOKLYN has a lengthy Park Avenue, as does Manhattan and the Bronx. In Manhattan, Park Avenue, for its entire length, was once 4th Avenue, though only a short section remains between Union and Cooper Squares. In the Bronx, a succession of roads bordering the open cut of what was the NY Central Railroad and is now part of the Metro North, were renamed Park Avenue over a century ago; the railroad, of course, runs on a viaduct above Park Avenue between East 97th Street and the Harlem River.
In Brooklyn, Park Avenue runs through Fort Greene, Bedford-Stuyvesant, Bushwick, Brooklyn (from Navy Street east to Broadway, a block north of Myrtle Avenue; it inexplicably changes its name to Park Street for a block between Broadway and Bushwick Avenue). Its most notable structure (as far as I have explored to date) is the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, built by the city in segments between 1937 and 1964.
It’s unclear if Brooklyn’s Park Avenue was named for its Manhattan counterpart (unlikely, since Park Avenue in Manhattan was called 4th Avenue for much of its history. We do know that Brooklyn’s Park Avenue was first opened in 1839.
From twitter: “The first city park in Brooklyn was what is now Commodore Barry Park, built around 1836. So Park Avenue originally connected the city to its park.”
Think of Park Avenue in NYC and you think of upscale apartments, Grand Central Terminal, the historic Lever House, the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, St. Bartholomew’s Church, and so many others from un-forgotten NY. But Manhattan and Brooklyn’s Park Avenue are similar in one respect. Brooklyn’s Park Avenue also had an elevated train structure running above it…but it only saw passenger service for four years, between 1885 to 1889. It was part of a group of early elevated trains constructed in Brooklyn in the 1880s that included the long-gone 5th and Lexington Avenue els.
More of NYC’s “Little Brother” streets
9/22/22
3 comments
There are also lesser street called Park Ave in Queens and Staten Island, in fact Park Ave is the most common street name in all of New York State as variation appear in other cities of New York including Buffalo, Rochester, and Albany and as well.in many suburbs
The Twitter comment is correct.
City Park (now Commodore Barry Park) was established around 1836 at what was then the outskirts of the developed portion of Brooklyn. Park Avenue was laid out along the southern boundary of the park as part of the 1839 street grid and extended east to the (then) city line at Division Avenue. (now Broadway)
I don’t know why the final block between Broadway and Bushwick Avenue is called Park Street, but I’ll venture a guess: Bushwick was originally a separate township and was annexed by the City of Brooklyn in 1855. The Bushwick street grid was established at about that time. The surveyors may have simply gone with Park Street instead of avenue for no real reason other than that was how they named it. The name then stuck all these years later.
The elevated above Park Avenue you mentioned was part of the original “Main Line,” which in a few years was replaced by the “New Main Line.” taking a different route. The “Old Main Line” was the only elevated train structure in Brooklyn that never saw electrified service.