Roosevelt Island
The Roving Runner: Roosevelt Island
By Brian Fidelman
Tina Fineberg for The New York Times
Roosevelt Island, tucked between Manhattan and Queens, is easily explorable on foot.
The Roving Runner
Exploring New York on the run.
Roving Governors Island Running in Red Hook A Trip to the Cloisters Baseball Nostalgia in the Bronx
Roosevelt Island is sitting right there. A thin, two-mile-long slice of residential life sandwiched between Manhattan and Queens, I had seen it and heard about it, but somehow after 13 years of living in the city, I’d never been there.
What better way to see a tiny island than by running around it?
I grabbed my Metrocard, keys and $10, and rode the 4 train from Union Square two stops up to 59th Street. From there I took a short walk to Second Avenue, swiped my Metrocard and boarded the Roosevelt Island Tram.
While this was just a daily commute for most people on board, it was quite a treat for a first-timer. This is the type of cable car you see on a steep mountain, not in the middle of New York City. The tram glided eastward and upward, climbing 250 feet in the air and softly descending onto the island. Throughout the four-and-a-half minute trip, I craned my neck to soak in the views behind us in Manhattan, ahead into Queens, and along the East River, just feet from the Queensboro Bridge. (The F train also stops on Roosevelt Island, but now is the time to take the tram because it is scheduled to shut for six months for renovation.)
Before I started my run, I stopped in the visitors center, located in an old trolley kiosk. The woman inside, who works for the Roosevelt Island Historical Society, gave me a little background on this quirky island, which is home to about 12,000 people of varying incomes and ethnicities.
In the past, she told me, Roosevelt Island was the site of several institutions for the sick, mentally ill and criminally convicted. It became residential in the 1970s. She also assured me that the island is a great place to run, because a path follows along most of the island’s perimeter, making for an easy four mile route. (Next month, Roosevelt Island will be the site for the “Run for Congo Women 5K.”)
After thanking her for the history lesson, I turned south and began running along the river promenade, passing under the Queensboro Bridge, which crosses over but doesn’t stop on Roosevelt Island. To my left was a tennis bubble, and to my right, the skyscrapers of Manhattan.
Brian Fidelman
Roosevelt Island’s Smallpox Hospital, sometimes called the Renwick Ruin.I passed Coler Goldwater Hospital and approached a fenced-off area near the southern end of the island. The sign said “No Trespassing,” but the woman at the kiosk had told me to go right through the open gate. I came upon the ruins of the Smallpox Hospital, which opened in 1856, became a training school for nurses in the 1880s and was abandoned in the 1950s. The landmark structure, designed by James Renwick Jr. (who also designed St. Patrick’s Cathedral), is being stabilized after its north facade recently collapsed. The ruins had a bombed-out, eerie beauty.
When I reached the island’s southern tip, I stood for a moment among the weeds. Nobody else was around, and it felt like a lonely outpost, even though the United Nations was only a few hundred yards away across the East River. Off to the left was the famous Pepsi-Cola sign in Hunters Point, Queens.
Work finally has begun on making this southern point the Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Park. How long has that plan been around? Its designer, the renowned architect Louis Kahn, died in 1974.
Brian Fidelman
Blackwell House is among New York City’s oldest surviving homes.I exited the construction zone and returned to the island path, which took me to the Queens-facing side of the island. I ran up the eastern promenade for several minutes before spotting Blackwell House, a post-Revolutionary farmhouse that is one of the city’s oldest surviving houses. The area was bustling with children playing and residents walking around.
The atmosphere here seemed a world away from Manhattan. The island feels like a secluded residential enclave, yet with enough of an urban vibe to make it uniquely different from a suburb.
Across the river in Queens, the landscape was dominated by a mammoth industrial plant that I told myself I would try to identify when I got home. The answer: it’s the Ravenswood electrical station, and it generates about a quarter of New York City’s electrical needs. What I couldn’t see were several underwater turbines, belonging to a company called Verdant Power. The turbines have been providing renewable power to Roosevelt Island’s large parking garage and the adjoining Gristedes supermarket as part of a demonstration project the company hopes to expand.
I continued running north, passing the Roosevelt Island Bridge (on which cars come and go from Queens), as well as tennis courts and playing fields. I stopped here briefly at a water fountain.
Off to the left was the Octagon Tower, which in the 1800s was part of the New York Lunatic Asylum and is now the lobby for an apartment building. It was here that the journalist Nellie Bly gained entry by faking insanity. Her expose of the poor conditions led to major changes and made her famous.
I reached the park at the northern end of the island, looped around a pretty 19th-century lighthouse, and headed back south, with apartment buildings and swimming pools to my left and the river to my right. I passed a few other joggers and some people in motorized wheelchairs. I gazed across the water to Manhattan’s Upper East Side, where I could see people jogging and biking on the path above the FDR Drive.
I had run a leisurely pace until now, but as I completed my lap around the island I saw an oil tanker just to my right floating along slightly faster than I was running. I sped up to stay even with the tanker and kept pace for about a minute, smiling my way through this “race.” The vessel gradually pulled away and I slowed back down, enjoying some more views of Manhattan and grateful that I had made this trip.
Here’s the route I took, tracked by G-map Pedometer.
By Brian Fidelman
Tina Fineberg for The New York Times
Roosevelt Island, tucked between Manhattan and Queens, is easily explorable on foot.
The Roving Runner
Exploring New York on the run.
Roving Governors Island Running in Red Hook A Trip to the Cloisters Baseball Nostalgia in the Bronx
Roosevelt Island is sitting right there. A thin, two-mile-long slice of residential life sandwiched between Manhattan and Queens, I had seen it and heard about it, but somehow after 13 years of living in the city, I’d never been there.
What better way to see a tiny island than by running around it?
I grabbed my Metrocard, keys and $10, and rode the 4 train from Union Square two stops up to 59th Street. From there I took a short walk to Second Avenue, swiped my Metrocard and boarded the Roosevelt Island Tram.
While this was just a daily commute for most people on board, it was quite a treat for a first-timer. This is the type of cable car you see on a steep mountain, not in the middle of New York City. The tram glided eastward and upward, climbing 250 feet in the air and softly descending onto the island. Throughout the four-and-a-half minute trip, I craned my neck to soak in the views behind us in Manhattan, ahead into Queens, and along the East River, just feet from the Queensboro Bridge. (The F train also stops on Roosevelt Island, but now is the time to take the tram because it is scheduled to shut for six months for renovation.)
Before I started my run, I stopped in the visitors center, located in an old trolley kiosk. The woman inside, who works for the Roosevelt Island Historical Society, gave me a little background on this quirky island, which is home to about 12,000 people of varying incomes and ethnicities.
In the past, she told me, Roosevelt Island was the site of several institutions for the sick, mentally ill and criminally convicted. It became residential in the 1970s. She also assured me that the island is a great place to run, because a path follows along most of the island’s perimeter, making for an easy four mile route. (Next month, Roosevelt Island will be the site for the “Run for Congo Women 5K.”)
After thanking her for the history lesson, I turned south and began running along the river promenade, passing under the Queensboro Bridge, which crosses over but doesn’t stop on Roosevelt Island. To my left was a tennis bubble, and to my right, the skyscrapers of Manhattan.
Brian Fidelman
Roosevelt Island’s Smallpox Hospital, sometimes called the Renwick Ruin.I passed Coler Goldwater Hospital and approached a fenced-off area near the southern end of the island. The sign said “No Trespassing,” but the woman at the kiosk had told me to go right through the open gate. I came upon the ruins of the Smallpox Hospital, which opened in 1856, became a training school for nurses in the 1880s and was abandoned in the 1950s. The landmark structure, designed by James Renwick Jr. (who also designed St. Patrick’s Cathedral), is being stabilized after its north facade recently collapsed. The ruins had a bombed-out, eerie beauty.
When I reached the island’s southern tip, I stood for a moment among the weeds. Nobody else was around, and it felt like a lonely outpost, even though the United Nations was only a few hundred yards away across the East River. Off to the left was the famous Pepsi-Cola sign in Hunters Point, Queens.
Work finally has begun on making this southern point the Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Park. How long has that plan been around? Its designer, the renowned architect Louis Kahn, died in 1974.
Brian Fidelman
Blackwell House is among New York City’s oldest surviving homes.I exited the construction zone and returned to the island path, which took me to the Queens-facing side of the island. I ran up the eastern promenade for several minutes before spotting Blackwell House, a post-Revolutionary farmhouse that is one of the city’s oldest surviving houses. The area was bustling with children playing and residents walking around.
The atmosphere here seemed a world away from Manhattan. The island feels like a secluded residential enclave, yet with enough of an urban vibe to make it uniquely different from a suburb.
Across the river in Queens, the landscape was dominated by a mammoth industrial plant that I told myself I would try to identify when I got home. The answer: it’s the Ravenswood electrical station, and it generates about a quarter of New York City’s electrical needs. What I couldn’t see were several underwater turbines, belonging to a company called Verdant Power. The turbines have been providing renewable power to Roosevelt Island’s large parking garage and the adjoining Gristedes supermarket as part of a demonstration project the company hopes to expand.
I continued running north, passing the Roosevelt Island Bridge (on which cars come and go from Queens), as well as tennis courts and playing fields. I stopped here briefly at a water fountain.
Off to the left was the Octagon Tower, which in the 1800s was part of the New York Lunatic Asylum and is now the lobby for an apartment building. It was here that the journalist Nellie Bly gained entry by faking insanity. Her expose of the poor conditions led to major changes and made her famous.
I reached the park at the northern end of the island, looped around a pretty 19th-century lighthouse, and headed back south, with apartment buildings and swimming pools to my left and the river to my right. I passed a few other joggers and some people in motorized wheelchairs. I gazed across the water to Manhattan’s Upper East Side, where I could see people jogging and biking on the path above the FDR Drive.
I had run a leisurely pace until now, but as I completed my lap around the island I saw an oil tanker just to my right floating along slightly faster than I was running. I sped up to stay even with the tanker and kept pace for about a minute, smiling my way through this “race.” The vessel gradually pulled away and I slowed back down, enjoying some more views of Manhattan and grateful that I had made this trip.
Here’s the route I took, tracked by G-map Pedometer.
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