72nd Street is one of the major bi-directional crosstown streets in the New York City borough of Manhattan. Where the west end of 72nd Street curves into the south end of Riverside Drive, the memorial to Eleanor Roosevelt stands in Riverside Park. At this end of the street is the landmarked Beaux-Arts Chatsworth Apartments (344 West 72nd Street, John E. Scharsmith, architect, 1902-04, Annex, 1905-06).[1]
At 72nd Street, Broadway crosses Amsterdam Avenue, creating a minute triangular space, Verdi Square; across the street to the south lies Sherman Square.
72nd Street is one of the few streets to go through Central Park, connecting the Upper West Side via Women's Gate, Terrace Drive and Inventors Gate, with the Upper East Side. However, Terrace Drive is often closed to vehicular traffic and therefore the crosstown M72 bus crosses the park at 65th Street.
The Dakota apartment building is located on the corner of West 72nd Street and Central Park West. Before automotive traffic, broad cross-streets offered desirable sites for prominent residences; the mansion at the southeast corner of Fifth Avenue was the first of the Gilded Age mansions to be replaced by an apartment block, 907 Fifth Avenue, and McKim, Mead, and White’s Charles L. Tiffany mansion (1882) at the northeast corner of Madison Avenue was replaced by an apartment block (19 East 72nd Street, Rosario Candela, architect[2]), but the Rhinelander Mansion, occupied now by Ralph Lauren, is still located on the southeast corner.
At Third Avenue, the Tower East apartment block (1960) set a new model for high-rise residences, a slab tower set back from the street front and isolated on a low base.[3]
On October 11, 2006, the Belaire Apartments, a 50-story apartment complex located at 524 E. 72nd Street between York Avenue and the FDR Drive, was the site of a plane crash involving Cory Lidle's aircraft.
Tunneling for the new Second Avenue Subway began in 2010; Trains will stop at 72nd Street station. Meanwhile, the closest subway stops for 72nd Street on the Upper East Side are the 68th and 77th Street stations (4 6 <6> trains) of the IRT Lexington Avenue Line.
72nd Street is a major stop on several lines of the New York City Subway system.
The M72 provides crosstown bus service to Upper East Side – York Avenue (eastbound) or West Side – Freedom Place (westbound) via 72nd Street.