Houston Street

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Houston Street
East Houston Street NYC 9183.JPG
Looking east from Orchard Street
Houston Street
Namesake William Houstoun
Length2.0 mi (3.2 km)
Location New York
ZIP Codes10002, 10009, 10012, 10014
West end NY-9A.svg NY 9A/West Side Highway
East end FDR Drive Shield.svg Franklin D. Roosevelt East River Drive (FDR Drive)

Houston Street ( /ˈhaʊstən/ HOW-stən) is a major east–west thoroughfare in Lower Manhattan in New York City, United States. It runs the full width of the island of Manhattan, from FDR Drive along the East River in the east to the West Side Highway along the Hudson River in the west. The street is divided into west and east sections by Broadway.

Contents

Houston Street generally serves as the boundary between neighborhoods on the East Side of Manhattan—Alphabet City, the East Village, NoHo, Greenwich Village, and the West Village to the north; and the Lower East Side, most of the Bowery, Nolita, and SoHo to the south. The numeric street-naming grid in Manhattan, created as part of the Commissioners' Plan of 1811, begins immediately north of Houston Street with 1st Street at Avenue A. [1]

The street's name is pronounced "HOW-stən" ( /ˈhaʊstən/ ), in contrast to the city of Houston, Texas, whose name is pronounced "HYOO-stən" ( /ˈhjuːstən/ ). The street was named for William Houstoun, whose surname was pronounced "HOW-stən", while the city was named for Sam Houston. [2]

Description

Houston Street (1917) by George Luks George Luks - Houston Street.jpg
Houston Street (1917) by George Luks

At its east end, Houston Street meets FDR Drive in an interchange at East River Park. West of FDR Drive, it intersects with Avenue D. Further west, other streets, including First Avenue, the Bowery, Lafayette Street and Broadway, intersect Houston Street. The Broadway intersection is the division point between East Houston Street and West Houston Street. Sixth Avenue intersects Houston Street at a curve in the road in Greenwich Village. East of Sixth Avenue, Houston street is bidirectional and separated by a median; west of Sixth, the street is narrower and unidirectional westbound. [3] West Houston Street terminates at an intersection with West Street near Pier 40 on the Hudson River.

History

East Houston Street between Clinton and Suffolk Streets in the 1920s East Houston Street 1920s.jpg
East Houston Street between Clinton and Suffolk Streets in the 1920s

Houston Street is named for William Houstoun, who was a delegate from the state of Georgia to the Continental Congress from 1784 through 1786 and to the Constitutional Convention in 1787. [1] The street was christened by Nicholas Bayard (b. 1736), whose daughter, Mary, was married to Houstoun in 1788. [4] The couple met while Houstoun, a member of an ancient and aristocratic Scottish family, was serving in the Congress. Bayard cut the street through a tract he owned in the vicinity of Canal Street in which he lived, and the city later extended it to include North Street, the northern border of New York's east side at the beginning of the 19th century. [4]

The current spelling of the name is a corruption: the street appears as Houstoun in the city's Common Council minutes for 1808 and the official map drawn in 1811 to establish the street grid that is still current. In those years, the Texas hero Sam Houston, for whom the street is sometimes incorrectly said to have been named, was an unknown teenager in Tennessee. [1] Also mistaken is the explanation that the name derives from the Dutch words huis for house and tuin for garden. [4] The narrow, westernmost stretch of the current Houston Street, from Sixth Avenue to the West Side Highway, was known as "Hammersley Street" (also spelled "Hamersly Street") until the middle 19th century, [5] and was inside Greenwich Village. It later came to be regarded as the Village's southern boundary.

In 1891, Nikola Tesla established his laboratory on Houston Street. Much of Tesla's research was lost in an 1895 fire.

The street, originally narrow, was markedly widened from Sixth Avenue to Essex Street in the early 1930s during construction of the Independent Subway System's Sixth Avenue Line. The street widening involved demolition of buildings on both sides of the street, resulting in numerous small, empty lots. [6] Although some of these lots have been redeveloped, many of them are now used by vendors, and some have been turned into playgrounds and, more recently, community gardens.

Houston Street at Lafayette Street in 1974 WALL PAINTING ON A BUILDING ON HOUSTON STREET IN NEW YORK CITY'S MANHATTAN. THE INNER CITY TODAY IS AN ABSOLUTE... - NARA - 555910 crop.jpg
Houston Street at Lafayette Street in 1974

Lower Manhattan's SoHo district takes its name from an acronym for "South of Houston", as the street serves as SoHo's northern boundary; another, narrower neighborhood north of Houston Street is correspondingly called NoHo.

In 1971, Houston Street became the southernmost street in Manhattan to extend between both the Hudson and East Rivers, when the World Trade Center was constructed and deprived Fulton Street of that title. [7] With the reconstruction of the World Trade Center, Fulton Street was extended past Church Street to West Street, but is closed off to vehicular traffic west of Church Street. [8]

A reconstruction project rebuilt parts of the street between 2005 and 2018. [9]

Transportation

As of 2024, Houston Street is served by the M21 New York City Bus route from Columbia to Washington Streets westbound, and from 6th Avenue to the FDR Drive eastbound. The bus route itself had replaced an earlier streetcar line, which is now the M9 between Avenues A and C. Additional service is provided by the eastbound M14D SBS east of Avenue D and the downtown M15 from Second Avenue to Allen Street. The M15 SBS does not make any stops on Houston Street. [10]

A portion of the New York City Subway's IND Sixth Avenue Line runs under Houston Street, between Sixth Avenue to just before Avenue A; [11] there are stations at Second Avenue ( F and <F> ​trains) and Broadway – Lafayette Street ( B ,​ D ,​ F , <F> , and​ M trains). Additionally, there is a station at Seventh Avenue, for the Houston Street ( 1 and​ 2 trains). [12] The Bleecker Street station ( 4 ,​ 6 , and <6> trains) has station entrances on the north side of Houston Street, due to its connection with the Broadway – Lafayette Street station as part of a larger station complex. [13]

Exit 5 on the FDR Drive is on Houston Street. The street also connects directly with the West Side Highway; however, by then, Houston Street is westbound-only.

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SoHo, short for "South of Houston Street", is a neighborhood in Lower Manhattan, New York City. Since the 1970s, the neighborhood has been the location of many artists' lofts and art galleries, and has also been known for its variety of shops ranging from trendy upscale boutiques to national and international chain store locations. The area's history is an archetypal example of inner-city regeneration and gentrification, encompassing socioeconomic, cultural, political, and architectural developments.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Avenue C (Manhattan)</span> Avenue in Manhattan, New York

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Second Avenue (Manhattan)</span> North-south avenue in Manhattan, New York

Second Avenue is located on the East Side of the New York City borough of Manhattan extending from Houston Street at its south end to the Harlem River Drive at 128th Street at its north end. A one-way street, vehicular traffic on Second Avenue runs southbound (downtown) only, except for a one-block segment of the avenue in Harlem. South of Houston Street, the roadway continues as Chrystie Street south to Canal Street.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">125th Street (Manhattan)</span> West-east street in Manhattan, New York

125th Street, co-named Martin Luther King Jr., Boulevard is a two-way street that runs east–west in the New York City borough of Manhattan, from First Avenue on the east to Marginal Street, a service road for the Henry Hudson Parkway along the Hudson River in the west. It is often considered to be the "Main Street" of Harlem.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">34th Street (Manhattan)</span> West-east street in Manhattan, New York

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The M21 bus route constitutes a public transit line in Manhattan, New York City. The M21 operates between the West Village and the Lower East Side, serving as a Houston Street crosstown. The M9 and M21 are operated by the Manhattan and Bronx Surface Transit Operating Authority, and based out of the Michael J. Quill Depot.

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References

  1. 1 2 3 Peretz Square, New York City Department of Parks and Recreation. Accessed July 12, 2007. "North Street, then the northern boundary of settled Manhattan, was later renamed for William Houstoun, a Georgia delegate to the Continental Congress; at the time of the renaming, the more famous Sam Houston was an unknown teenager"
  2. ↑ "New York Bookshelf; An Oddly Named Street, A Dark Night, a Gamy Club". The New York Times. February 8, 2004. Retrieved January 19, 2011.
  3. ↑ West Houston Street - NYC.gov
  4. 1 2 3 Moscow, Henry. The Street Book: An Encyclopedia of Manhattan's Street Names and Their Origins. New York: Fordham University Press, 1990. ISBN   0-8232-1275-0. p. 61.
  5. ↑ New York City Parks Department Hammersley Street
  6. ↑ Gray, Christopher (April 18, 2004). "Amid the Giant Ad Signs, New Buildings Sprout". The New York Times. Retrieved July 29, 2010.
  7. ↑ "Lower Manhattan Necrology". Forgotten New York. September 3, 1999. Retrieved April 22, 2020.
  8. ↑ Dunlap, David W. (August 1, 2014). "At World Trade Center Site, Rebuilding Recreates Intersection of Long Ago". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331. Archived from the original on February 28, 2018. Retrieved February 23, 2018.
  9. ↑ "HWM738 - Reconstruction of Houston Street" (PDF). New York City Department of Design and Construction. Retrieved November 16, 2022.
  10. ↑ "Manhattan Bus Map" (PDF). mta.info . Metropolitan Transportation Authority. 2015. Retrieved August 19, 2015.
  11. ↑ 2nd Avenue – nycsubway.org
  12. ↑ "Subway Map" (PDF). Metropolitan Transportation Authority. September 2021. Retrieved September 17, 2021.
  13. ↑ "MTA Neighborhood Maps: neighborhood". Metropolitan Transportation Authority. 2018. Retrieved October 1, 2018.

Further reading


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