Coney Island Creek
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Coney Island Creek encompasses two sea inlets in Brooklyn, New York City, one separating Coney Island from the neighborhoods of Gravesend and Bath Beach, the other separating the neighborhoods of Sheepshead Bay and Manhattan Beach. Prior to construction of the Shore Parkway in the 1950s, Coney Island Creek was a strait connecting Gravesend Bay and Sheepshead Bay, making Coney Island an actual island.
[edit] History
Coney Island Creek was minimally navigable and in the early 20th century the City of New York developed plans to widen, straighten and deepen it as the Gravesend Ship Canal.[citation needed] Those plans never came to fruition. Instead, a portion of the creek was filled in, making Coney Island a peninsula.
[edit] Geography
The western inlet of Coney Island Creek extends eastward from Gravesend Bay to Shell Road. The path of the landfill follows Shore Parkway, Guider Avenue, and the triangular block between Neptune Avenue and Cass Place.The eastern inlet picks up at Shore Boulevard and gradually widens into Sheepshead Bay.
[edit] Access
The western inlet can be seen from street bridges at Cropsey Avenue (between Bay 54th Street and Hart Place) and Stillwell Avenue (between Shore Parkway and Neptune Avenue), and from the D/N New York City Subway lines several yards east of Stillwell Avenue (and just north of the Coney Island--Stillwell Avenue Station). The inlet can also be seen through the fence of a parking lot on Neptune Avenue near West 12th Street. It remains mostly undeveloped and has become polluted, running along private industrial property and several acres owned by Keyspan, the local electricity provider. Marine traffic is restricted by a cable net between Cropsey and Stillwell Avenues.
The eastern inlet, spanned by a pedestrian pontoon bridge at Sheepshead Bay Road, has been widened and developed with promenades, docks, and restaurants and is referred to by residents of Sheepshead Bay and Manhattan Beach simply as "the canal." It can be visited by car from the Belt Parkway (exits 8 and 9), or by subway, from the Sheepshead Bay Station of the B/Q elevated subway line. Marine traffic is restricted by the pedestrian bridge.
