14. Wagner Park
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Once you walk through the tall iron gates across West Street, you are in Battery Park City, a 92-acre landfill site whose dirt came from excavations for the World Trade Center. One third of the residential and commercial complex is devoted to public areas, plazas, gardens, and parks. This is Robert F. Wagner Jr. Park, designed as a quiet spot for passive pursuits, with benches among the plantings, a large grass terrace, and a cafe. At the top of the brick pavillion, which creates a frame for the Statue of Liberty, is a stunning view and plaques to help identify what you're seeing. All around along the neighborhood's 1.5-mile-long Hudson River Esplanande are sculptures by known and emerging artists. |
Keeping such a beautiful oasis maintained carries a high price tag: an annual $4 per square foot. That's at least 10 times the average New York City spends to tend a square foot of public parkland. Why such a big difference? Renters and owners in Battery Park City are assessed for the amenity that benefits them as well as all the city's residents.
The low gray building with the stepped roof is the Museum of Jewish Heritage. Its hexagonal shape evokes the six million Jews who were killed in the Holocaust as well as the Star of David.
With the river on your left, continue along the esplanade to the next location.