79th Street is a major two-way street in the Upper East Side and Upper West Side of the New York City borough of Manhattan. East 79th Street stretches from East End Avenue to Fifth Avenue on the Upper East Side, where it enters Central Park through Miners' Gate. The 79th Street Transverse crosses Central Park, connecting Hunters Gate at West 81st Street on the Upper West Side to Children's Gate on East 79th. 79th Street does not exist between Central Park West and Columbus Avenue, due to the superblock occupied by the American Museum of Natural History. West of Columbus Avenue, 79th Street continues and terminates at an exit/entrance ramp for the West Side Highway, under which sit the Boat Basin Cafe and 79th Street Boat Basin. On the west side, the street is entirely within the boundaries of ZIP Code 10024; on the east side, as of July 1, 2007, the ZIP Code for this part of the Lenox Hill Post Office Branch changed from 10021 to 10075.

History

The interchange on the Hudson River and the boat basin were constructed by 1937, during the tenure of Robert Moses as Parks Commissioner, as part of the grand architectural multi-level entry and exit from the Henry Hudson Parkway under the name of the "79th Street Grade Crossing Elimination Structure", and first proposed in 1934. The project was designed to have 79th Street pass under the Parkway, eliminating a railroad grade crossing. Designed by Gilmore David Clarke, the Works Projects Administration provided $5.1 million for the project, which included an underground parking garage (still functioning) and a restaurant as well as the marina.

Transportation

The 79th Street station on the IRT Broadway-Seventh Avenue Line is located at the intersection of 79th Street and Broadway. It is served by the train (all times), and by the train (late nights).

The M79 79th Street crosstown bus route runs from between the 79th Street Boat Basin and East End Avenue at all times.

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 long and wide, and held up to 180 million gallons of water. Thirty-five million gallons flowed into it daily from northern Westchester.

• Mayor Michael Bloomberg lives in a five-story townhouse at 17 East 79th Street, between Madison Avenue and Fifth Avenue. Other notable residents of 79th Street include Tom Wolfe, 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.

• The New York Society Library, at 53 East 79th street, is the city's oldest (1754) circulating library; it occupies a double-width townhouse built for John S. and Catherine Dodge Rogers, (Trowbridge & Livingston, 1916-18). Christopher Gray, "The New York Society Library: The John S. Rogers House", 2008
• East 79th Street is an unnumbered southbound only entrance to the FDR Drive.
• East 79th Street is the southern end of East End Avenue, which runs north-south to 90th Street.

References