U Thant Island

Coordinates: 40°44′48″N 73°57′52″W / 40.746599°N 73.964387°W / 40.746599; -73.964387
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

U Thant Island
borough of Manhattan in New York City. The 100-by-200-foot (30 by 60 m) island, created during the construction of the Steinway Tunnel directly underneath, is the smallest island in Manhattan.[1][2]

Location and jurisdiction

The tiny

United Nations Headquarters at 42nd Street, in Manhattan to the west, and Gantry Plaza State Park in Long Island City, within Queens to the east. It is legally part of Manhattan and is formally a part of Manhattan Community District 6, which also includes the neighborhoods of Turtle Bay and Murray Hill to the west of U Thant Island.[5]

The island is owned by the New York State Government and is currently protected as a sanctuary for migrating birds, including a small colony of double-crested cormorants. The cormorant population more than doubled from 2000 to 2011.[6] The Borough, Block and Lot is Manhattan, Block 1373 (shared with Roosevelt Island), and Lot 200.[7] Public access is prohibited.[8][9][10] Since 2016, the island has been designated a Recognized Ecological Complex under the city's Waterfront Revitalization Program.[11][12] The reefs in the waters surrounding the island make it a popular spot for boats fishing for striped bass.[13][14] The United States Coast Guard maintains a 57-foot (17 m) tall lighted beacon on the island, designated "Roosevelt Island Reef Light 17";[4][15] an earlier 23-foot (7 m) tall light had been erected in 1938,[16] and another pair before then.[17]

Sandy Hook
.

History

In the 1890s, businessman

<7>​ trains), and are now part of the New York City Subway system.[19] Buildings from the tunnel stayed up until at least 1918.[20]

In 1964, the 33,310-short-ton (30,218 t) Norwegian fuel oil tanker Sigdal ran aground on the island, imperiling East River traffic.[21][22][23]

In 1968, the Hudson Institute published a proposal for connecting Roosevelt Island and U Thant Island by landfill to form a single larger island, as part of an economic redevelopment. 42nd Street would have extended across the island from Manhattan to Queens, connected by a Ponte Vecchio-like bridge covered in shops. "Belmont Center", modeled on Rockefeller Center, would have had towers of up to 80 stories.[24][25][26]

A Jet d'Eau–like fountain sponsored by George T. Delacorte Jr. stood nearby on Roosevelt Island from 1969 to 1987, and faced calls for its relocation to U Thant Island due to environmental hazards throughout its existence, at the time of its installation, in a 1972–74 lawsuit, and at the time it was finally demolished.[27][28]

In 1972, the island was declared "

Soviet Jewry Freedom Island" and symbolically occupied for 2+1⁄2 hours by activists led by Manhattan and Bronx Borough Presidents Percy Sutton and Robert Abrams to protest a United Nations speech by Leonid Brezhnev and the imposition of the diploma tax as a barrier to emigration from the Soviet Union.[29][30]

The Chrysler Building and United Nations Secretariat Building, with U Thant Island in the foreground

In 1977, the island was adopted by a group called the Peace Meditation at the United Nations, employees at the United Nations headquarters and followers of the guru

United Nations Secretary General U Thant, a friend of Chinmoy. In 1982, Belmont Island was officially rededicated as U Thant Island.[31][32] It is now the site of a metal "oneness arch", preserving personal items of the island's namesake.[8][33]

In 1999, The New York Times Magazine staged an international competition to design a time capsule to preserve artifacts for the next millennium. An entry by Caples Jefferson Architects proposed a granite obelisk on U Thant Island that would gradually disintegrate, leaving only the time capsule by the end of the 30th century.[34]

During the 2004 Republican National Convention, local artist and filmmaker Duke Riley, who has traveled to various abandoned islands around the New York City area, rowed a boat with a friend to the island under cover of darkness, proclaimed it a sovereign nation and hoisted a 21-foot (6.4 m)-long pennant depicting two electric eels from the island's navigation tower. On their return voyage in daylight, they were apprehended by a United States Coast Guard boat but were not arrested. The entire incident was videotaped for a piece Riley titled Belmont Island (SMEACC).[35]

  • island surrounded by barges
    Newly-built island in 1906 during tunnel construction
  • tiny island with metal structure on it
    U Thant Island from the west-southwest
  • islet with bridges behind it
    View of the islet from the south

References

  1. ^ Duffy, Karen (October 11, 2011). "New York's Treasure Trove of Tiny Islands". MetroFocus. Retrieved July 12, 2019.
  2. ^ Frishberg, Hannah (August 26, 2014). "Get To Know 34 of New York City's Most Obscure Islands". Curbed NY. Retrieved July 12, 2019.
  3. ^ Mascia, Jennifer (July 5, 2009). "Sand, Surf and Shoobies". The New York Times. Retrieved February 28, 2010.
  4. ^ a b Chart 12335 (Map). 1 : 10,000. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. April 1, 2009. Retrieved February 28, 2010.
  5. ^ "Community Profiles". New York City Department of City Planning. Retrieved March 18, 2019.
  6. ^ Elbin, Susan; Craig, Liz (December 5, 2011). "Cormorant Population in the NY Harbor 2005-2011" (PDF). National Park Service. New York City Audubon. Archived from the original (PDF) on December 19, 2018. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  7. ^ "NYC Finance". a836-pts-access.nyc.gov. Retrieved July 23, 2019.
  8. ^ a b Schneider, Daniel B. (October 6, 1996). "F.Y.I." The New York Times. Retrieved February 28, 2010.
  9. ^ Brody, Jane E. (September 8, 1998). "A Cleaner Harbor Lures Water Birds to New York". The New York Times. Retrieved February 28, 2010.
  10. ^ Berger, Joseph (December 4, 2003). "So, You Were Expecting a Pigeon?; In City Bustle, Herons, Egrets and Ibises Find a Sanctuary". The New York Times. Retrieved July 12, 2009.
  11. ^ "The Waterfront Revitalization Program Overview". New York City Department of City Planning. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  12. ^ "The Waterfront Revitalization Program Maps & Policies". New York City Department of City Planning. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  13. ^ Kaminsky, Peter (November 7, 2004). "Some Special Spots in Shadow of Skyline". The New York Times. Retrieved February 28, 2010.
  14. ISBN 9781932098679
    .
  15. ^ "Light List, First District - Volume I" (PDF). United States Coast Guard, Navigation Center. 2023. HUDSON AND EAST RIVERS (Chart 12335). Light list number 27315. p. 243. Retrieved March 9, 2023.
  16. ^ Complete List of Lights and Other Marine Aids, Atlantic Coast of the United States. U.S. Government Printing Office. 1954.
  17. ^ Pugsley, Richard Marriotte (1910). The New York Pilot and Guide to the United States Local Inspectors Examination of Masters and Pilots for New York Bay and Harbor to Yonkers and Great Captain Island: And a Complete New York Pilot Containing All Useful Information. R.M. Pugsley.
  18. ^ "Four Lose Their Lives in Tunnel Disaster". Los Angeles Herald. January 17, 1906. Retrieved December 20, 2018 – via California Digital Newspaper Collection.
  19. ^ Rogoff, David (1960). "The Steinway Tunnels". Electric Railroads (29).
  20. ^ New York (N.Y.) (1918). The City Record: Official Journal. p. 3540. Retrieved May 26, 2020.
  21. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  22. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  23. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  24. ISSN 0028-792X
    . Retrieved December 19, 2018.
  25. ISBN 9780375505805
    .
  26. ^ Hudson Institute; Panero, Robert (1968). A Preliminary Approach to East River Development. Croton-on-Hudson.
  27. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved December 24, 2018.
  28. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved December 24, 2018.
  29. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  30. ^ "Remembrance: Percy Sutton, champion of the Soviet Jewry cause". Jewish Telegraphic Agency. December 30, 2009. Retrieved December 18, 2018.
  31. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved July 28, 2022.
  32. Newspapers.com
    .
  33. ^ Baard, Erik (June 4, 2002). "Holy Waters". The Village Voice. New York. Retrieved February 16, 2021.
  34. ^ Muschamp, Herbert (December 5, 1999). "Designs for the Next Millennium. Caples Jefferson". The New York Times. Retrieved July 12, 2009.
  35. ^ Tudor, Silke (May 23, 2006). "Life of Riley". The Village Voice. New York. Archived from the original on September 22, 2008. Retrieved July 12, 2009.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to U Thant Island.
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