Cherry Street (Manhattan)
Encyclopedia
One-way traffic
One-way traffic is traffic that moves in a single direction. A one-way street is a street either facilitating only one-way traffic, or designed to direct vehicles to move in one direction.-General signs:...
street in the New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
borough
Borough (New York City)
New York City, one of the largest cities in the world, is composed of five boroughs. Each borough now has the same boundaries as the county it is in. County governments were dissolved when the city consolidated in 1898, along with all city, town, and village governments within each county...
of Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
. It currently has two sections, mostly running along parks, public housing, co-op buildings, tenements, and crossing underneath the Manhattan Bridge overpass.
Current configuration
Its current configuration is:- Eastern terminus at the southern terminus of the FDR DriveFranklin D. Roosevelt East River DriveThe Franklin D. Roosevelt East River Drive is a freeway-standard parkway on the east side of the New York City borough of Manhattan...
South service lane, one block south of Grand StreetGrand Street (Manhattan)Grand Street is a street in Manhattan, New York City. It runs east-west parallel to and south of Delancey Street, from SoHo through Chinatown, Little Italy, the Lower East Side to the East River....
, where it bends right and turns into Cherry Street - Runs west for one block, along the north edge of Corlears Hook Park, to Jackson Street
- Demapped for approximately two blocks, from Jackson Street to Gouvernour Street and Gouvernour Street to Montgomery Street (Vladeck Houses built over demapped section)
- Continues west, running parallel to the FDR Drive and one block north of it, for three blocks, to Pike Street / Pike Slip
- Runs west from Pike, under the Manhattan BridgeManhattan BridgeThe Manhattan Bridge is a suspension bridge that crosses the East River in New York City, connecting Lower Manhattan with Brooklyn . It was the last of the three suspension bridges built across the lower East River, following the Brooklyn and the Williamsburg bridges...
access ramp, one block to Market Street - Runs one block further west, parallel to and one block north of Water Street. Cherry Street has its western terminus here, at the intersection where Catherine Street seamlessly becomes Catherine SlipCatherine Street and Catherine SlipCatherine Street is a street in the New York City borough of Manhattan's Chinatown neighborhood. At its southern end, it becomes Catherine Slip, though there are other sections of Catherine Slip besides the Catherine Street extension...
.
History and changes
Cherry Street was originally established in colonial times to run from the intersection of Pearl StreetPearl Street (Manhattan)
Pearl Street is a street in the Lower section of the New York City borough of Manhattan, running northeast from Battery Park to the Brooklyn Bridge, then turning west and terminating at Centre Street...
and Frankfort Street in Lower Manhattan
Lower Manhattan
Lower Manhattan is the southernmost part of the island of Manhattan, the main island and center of business and government of the City of New York...
, approximately 1.44 Mile east to Grand Street
Grand Street (Manhattan)
Grand Street is a street in Manhattan, New York City. It runs east-west parallel to and south of Delancey Street, from SoHo through Chinatown, Little Italy, the Lower East Side to the East River....
in Corlear's Hook. The section between Pearl Street and Catherine Street was removed block-by-block due to development, starting with the building of the Brooklyn Bridge in the 1860s. The removed section now contains the Alfred E. Smith Houses
Alfred E. Smith Houses
Governor Alfred E. Smith Houses, or the Alfred E. Smith Houses. is a public housing development built by the New York City Housing Authority in the Two Bridges neighborhood of the Lower East Side of Manhattan...
.
The section between Jackson Street and Montgomery Street, was also removed and demapped to provide for Vladeck Park. Vladeck Park was subsequently replaced with Vladeck Houses, a public housing building complex project.
The two demappings left a "widowed" one block stretch of Cherry at the eastern end, from Montgomery to the FDR Drive South service lane, which bends into Cherry Street as it ends. Prior to the constructions of the FDR, both Cherry Street and Grand Street extended a short distance further east than they now do, and met each other at the riverbank.
The street was named for the 7 acres (28,328 m²) cherry orchard that sat on the general location that was owned by Goovert Loockermans, a wealthy Dutch merchant who was the New Amsterdam
New Amsterdam
New Amsterdam was a 17th-century Dutch colonial settlement that served as the capital of New Netherland. It later became New York City....
representative of the Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
trading firm of Gillis Verbrugge & Company in the 1660s.
Notable residences and businesses
Loockermans' heirs sold the land in 1672 for $60.00. Richard Sackett acquired part of it, and opened a beer garden and a bowling green which became known as "Sackett's Orchard".In 1785, the four-story mansion at 3 Cherry Street was leased by the Continental Congress
Continental Congress
The Continental Congress was a convention of delegates called together from the Thirteen Colonies that became the governing body of the United States during the American Revolution....
to serve as the Executive Mansion for Richard Henry Lee
Richard Henry Lee
Richard Henry Lee was an American statesman from Virginia best known for the motion in the Second Continental Congress calling for the colonies' independence from Great Britain. He was a signatory to the Articles of Confederation and his famous resolution of June 1776 led to the United States...
, President of the Congress
President of the Continental Congress
The President of the Continental Congress was the presiding officer of the Continental Congress, the convention of delegates that emerged as the first national government of the United States during the American Revolution...
under the Articles of Confederation
Articles of Confederation
The Articles of Confederation, formally the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, was an agreement among the 13 founding states that legally established the United States of America as a confederation of sovereign states and served as its first constitution...
. It continued to serve as such for the next three Presidents and, in April and May of 1789 served as the first Executive Mansion of the President of the United States and Mrs. Martha Washington
Martha Washington
Martha Dandridge Custis Washington was the wife of George Washington, the first president of the United States. Although the title was not coined until after her death, Martha Washington is considered to be the first First Lady of the United States...
.
The mansion that belonged to Col. Samuel Osgood
Samuel Osgood
Samuel Osgood was an American merchant and statesman born in North Andover Massachusetts, parent town of the Andovers. His family home still stands at 440 Osgood Street in North Andover...
, the first Postmaster General of the United States. This house on Cherry Street, later demolished, was the first gas-lit
Gas lighting
Gas lighting is production of artificial light from combustion of a gaseous fuel, including hydrogen, methane, carbon monoxide, propane, butane, acetylene, ethylene, or natural gas. Before electricity became sufficiently widespread and economical to allow for general public use, gas was the most...
house in Manhattan, owned by Samuel Leggett, a founder of Con Edison. The house was serviced via gas pipe from Pearl Street. Though Cherry Street once ran through to Pearl Street, it has since been terminated at Catherine Street due to the Civic Square development.
In 1818, Henry Sands Brooks opened H. & D. H. Brooks & Co. on the northeast corner of Catherine and Cherry Streets in Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
"to make and deal only in merchandise of the finest body, to sell it at a fair profit, and to deal with people who seek and appreciate such merchandise." In 1850, his three sons, Elisha, Daniel, and John, inherited the family business and renamed the company "Brooks Brothers
Brooks Brothers
Brooks Brothers is the oldest men's clothier chain in the United States. Founded in 1818 as a family business, the privately owned company is now owned by Retail Brand Alliance, also features clothing for women, and is headquartered on Madison Avenue in Manhattan, New York City.-History:On April 7,...
," which is the oldest men's clothier chain in the United States.
In the 1930s, the first "superproject" development proposal in New York City was initiated for the Cherry Street area of Corlear's Hook. The Vladeck Houses
Vladeck Houses
Vladeck Houses is a public housing development built and maintained by the New York City Housing Authority on the Lower East Side of Manhattan...
, 24 six-story buildings, built on the former Vladeck Park, were completed in 1940. They were a precursor to the larger Unit Plans for public housing that predominated in later decades, including the Alfred E. Smith Houses
Alfred E. Smith Houses
Governor Alfred E. Smith Houses, or the Alfred E. Smith Houses. is a public housing development built by the New York City Housing Authority in the Two Bridges neighborhood of the Lower East Side of Manhattan...
that occupy the other "lost" section of Cherry Street.
A $50 million renovation of the Vladeck Houses began in 1998. Cherry Street also traverses the Rutgers Houses and La Guardia Houses. All three of these large-scale housing projects are NYCHA
New York City Housing Authority
The New York City Housing Authority provides public housing for low- and moderate-income residents throughout the five boroughs of New York City. NYCHA also administers a citywide Section 8 Leased Housing Program in rental apartments...
developments.
Currently, the majority of structures along Cherry Street are residential co-op apartments
Housing cooperative
A housing cooperative is a legal entity—usually a corporation—that owns real estate, consisting of one or more residential buildings. Each shareholder in the legal entity is granted the right to occupy one housing unit, sometimes subject to an occupancy agreement, which is similar to a lease. ...
, public housing
Public housing
Public housing is a form of housing tenure in which the property is owned by a government authority, which may be central or local. Social housing is an umbrella term referring to rental housing which may be owned and managed by the state, by non-profit organizations, or by a combination of the...
, and older tenement buildings south of the Manhattan Bridge
Manhattan Bridge
The Manhattan Bridge is a suspension bridge that crosses the East River in New York City, connecting Lower Manhattan with Brooklyn . It was the last of the three suspension bridges built across the lower East River, following the Brooklyn and the Williamsburg bridges...
.