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Manhattanville is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan bordered on the south by Morningside Heights on the west by the Hudson River, on the east by Harlem and on the north by Hamilton Heights. Its borders straddle both sides of West 125th Street, roughly from 122nd Street to 135th Street and from the Hudson River to St. Nicholas Park.
Throughout the 19th century, Manhattanville was a town that bustled around a wharf active with ferry and daily river conveyances. It was the first principal terminus on the northbound Hudson railroad, and the hub of daily stage coach, omnibus and streetcar lines. Situated near the famous Bloomingdale Road, its hotels, houses of entertainment and post office made it an alluring destination of suburban retreat from the city, yet its direct proximity to the Hudson River also made it an invaluable industrial checkpoint by which construction and freight materials could enter upper Manhattan. With the construction of road and railway viaducts over the valley in which the town sat, Manhattanville, increasingly absorbed into the growing city, became a marginalized industrial area.
The neighborhood is now the site of a major planned expansion of Columbia University, which has campuses in Morningside Heights to the south and Washington Heights to the north.
Colonial Period
Manhattanville sits in a valley formerly called Moertje David's Vly ('Mother David's Valley'; in Dutch 'Vly' is short for 'vallei' = valley) during the Dutch Colonial period and as Harlem Cove during the English Colonial period. During the American Revolutionary War, the valley was also known as the Hollow Way, where the main action of the Battle of Harlem Heights began under the command of General George Washington. During the War of 1812 the valley's southern ridges latered figured as the site of the Manhattanville Pass whose defense fortifications and breastworks included, now the sites of Morningside Gardens houses and Public School No. 36, respectively.
Village of Manhattanville
In 1806, the village of Manhattanville was established in this valley around the crossroads of Bloomingdale Road and Manhattan Street, now roughly Broadway and 125th Street. The village's original streets were laid out by Jacob Schieffelin and other wealthy merchants, mostly Quakers, who had country seats in the area. The town thrived as a result of the development of Manhattan Street from the Hudson River, whose convenient access also became a crucial catalyst in the growth of the older village of Harlem to the southeast on the Harlem River. Situated at approximately the same latitude, Harlem and Manhattanville flourished together throughout the 19th century as the two most prominent villages in upper Manhattan.
Manhattanville's early population was a diverse and eclectic mix of intermarried American patriots and British loyalists; at least one prominent former African slave trader; slave owners and enslaved African-Americans; Quaker anti-slavery activists and free black abolitionists; tradesmen, poor laborers and wealthy industrialists. Many were affiliated with the same institutions, principally the historic New York City landmarked St. Mary's Protestant Episcopal Church, organized in 1823, which was the first Episcopal church to dissolve pew rentals in 1831, and the Manhattanville Free School (established in 1827, later Public School No. 43) still at their original sites. Manhattanville's most prominent resident was industrialist Daniel F. Tiemann (1805-1899), owner of the D.F. Tiemann & Company Color Works, who was also Mayor of New York City from 1858 to 1859.
Immigration and Urbanization
Later noteworthy population changes occurred around the mid-19th century with the influx of mostly Catholic Irish (who established the Church of the Annunciation in 1854) and Germans (who established St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Church in 1860). After the American Civil War, the Jewish immigrant population that began to distinguish itself in Harlem gradually filtered into the western blocks of Manhattanville (and established Chevra Talmud Torah Anshei Marovi, also known as Old Broadway Synagogue, in 1911). Other prominent 19th-century Manhattanville institutions included the Academy of Convent of the Sacred Heart (later called Manhattanville College) and Manhattan College.
In 1904, the opening of the new Broadway Interborough Rapid Transit (IRT) subway line galvanized Manhattanville's radical transformation from rural exburb to an extension of the growing city, with the elevated railway providing rapid transit downtown. Cuban, Dominican and Puerto Rican immigrants moved into the area during the 20th century. By the 1970s, the southern part of Manhattanville (up to about 125th Street) was being filled by Columbia and Barnard College students, staff and faculty, as the university continued to expand. This trend has continued today and is spreading north. In 2006, Columbia built a new School of Social Work on Amsterdam Avenue at 122nd Street. In addition, other colleges have been building dormitories in the area, as described below. Also, West 125th Street has experienced a general economic upturn since the end of the 1990s. Many of the Harlem real estate buildings below 125th Street have converted to cooperative ownership as the area experiences continuing gentrification and increasing demand for housing.
University Expansions
Manhattanville is the site of a planned major Harlem real estate expansion of Columbia University. The university has begun to purchase several square blocks of the neighborhood between 125th and 133rd Streets on the south and north and between Broadway and 12th Avenue on the east and west. The current physical plant of those Harlem real estate blocks will be partly demolished to construct a new campus, secondary school and park land, designed by Italian architect Renzo Piano. Local residents fear the impact of the further Harlem real estate gentrification from this expansion in addition to the possible, and highly controversial, use of eminent domain. Groups such as the Coalition to Preserve Community, composed of local residents, and the West Harlem Business Group, made up of local businesses, oppose Columbia's current plan for expansion. In June 2007, the New York City Department of City Planning certified that Columbia's application for the rezoning is complete. This action launched the public review and comment period under the city's Uniform Land Use Review Procedure, which lasted until the end of 2007.
In November 2007, the New York Daily News summarized the plan as follows: "Columbia owns 65% [of the tract]. The state and Con Ed have 23%. That gives the university access to 88% of the tract. Most of the remaining 12% consists of two gas stations and a half-dozen Harlem real estate commercial properties. The school is trying to negotiate purchases. In the entire 17 acres of Harlem real estate, there are only 132 Harlem apartments with fewer than 300 tenants, and all have been offered equivalent or better housing, with a guarantee that eminent domain will not be used to acquire Harlem apartments. None of the Harlem apartments are in the first phase of the project; none will be touched until at least 2015. On December 19, 2007, the New York City Council voted to approve the University's proposed rezoning of the site.
To the north, a 600-unit student dorm known as 'The Towers' finished construction in June 2006 as an extension of the City College of New York on St. Nicholas Terrace. This is the first time that City College Harlem real estate has housed students on the campus. Occupation began in Fall 2006. To the south, near 122nd Street, the Manhattan School of Music also built a dormitory around 2003. Also in 2006, Jewish Theological Seminary opened a smaller dormitory on 122nd Street between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue. The increase in student residences is one of several factors rapidly changing the Harlem real estate character of Manhattanville, and cafes and restaurants have opened on Broadway, La Salle Street and Amsterdam Avenue to accommodate the population growth.
At 135th St. and Convent Avenue, City College is rapidly completing the construction of the new School of Architecture and Urban Design building. Based on a pre-existing 1950s structure this redesign and reconstruction by Rafael Viñoly Architects is intended to add a modern aesthetic to the eclectic architectural mix in the area.
West Harlem Piers
After a groundbreaking ceremony in November 2005, construction of the West Harlem Piers Waterfront park began in April 2006. The park, which will include a fishing pier, a kayak launch, sculptures, and water taxi landings, stretches from 125th St to 132nd Street, partly on Harlem real estate land formerly used as a parking lot. It closed a gap in the Manhattan Waterfront Greenway that runs along the western side of Manhattan Island and will later connect up the Hudson River. The park opened in early October 2008, delayed through the summer by the discovery that fencing designed to prevent users from falling into the river did not meet specifications. The area that surrounds the park and piers is at times called ViVa (Viaduct Valley).
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