Urban Gadabout reminder to New Yorkers and visitors: Upper Manhattan walks resume Sunday, continue through May 20

This aerial view of Sherman Creek in Northern Manhattan comes from the NYC Dept. of City Planning, whose note concerning the "currently inactive" Sherman Creek Study begins:

Sherman Creek lies along the Harlem River waterfront and is part of the Inwood neighborhood in Manhattan Community District 12. The primary study area is between Dyckman Street, Broadway, West 207th Street and the Harlem River, and includes Sherman Creek inlet, for which the surrounding area was named. The upland portion, between Broadway and Nagle Avenue, is a densely populated residential community, while the waterfront area, which is zoned primarily for industrial use, is characterized largely by underutilized and vacant land.

by Ken

Upper Manhattan historian James Renner began his spring series of WaHi walking tours of the neighborhoods of Washington Heights, Inwood, and Marble Hill with a walk through Fort Washington-Hudson Heights on March 25 -- a tour made that much richer by the presence of two lifelong residents of the area, who added all manner of wonderful local (and of course personal) detail.

Now, after a holiday hiatus, James's spring tours begin in earnest, with weekly tours every Sunday through May 20. On the scheule are: Sherman Creek, this Sunday; Fort George, April 22; Jumel Terrace Historic District & Sugar Hill, April 29; Audubon Park (see my notes on a Municipal Art Society tour of the area in the earlier post), May 6; Marble Hill, May 13; and Tubby Hook, May 20.

SHERMAN CREEK
Sunday, April 15, 2012, 12:00 noon

SHERMAN CREEK was named for a working class family that occupied a fisherman's shack in what is now Inwood in 1807. The family lived in the community for almost a century. During the American Revolution a ferry operated from Sherman Creek to the Bronx. The area was also home to the Dyckman Oval where the Negro Baseball League team the New York Cubans had played until the 1940s when the ballfield was razed for the Dyckman Houses, an urban renewal project. The Dyckman Houses was home to basketball great Kareem Abdul Jabbar.

MEET: Entrance of IRT #1 Dyckman Street Station

For the remaining tour descriptions and meeting places, see the full schedule, which I printed in the earlier post. All tours begin at noon and are $15 ($10 for students and seniors). You can contact James at 212-795-7830 JR6751@aol.com.

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