The Bronx: Louis A. Risse’s Grand Concourse Of 1897

The Bronx: Louis A. Risse’s Grand Concourse of 1897

The Bronx

“Nature has provided a Grand Boulevard and Concourse for the North Side and the City of New York such as no other city in the world possesses. Northward from the Cedar Parks, west of the Harlem Railroad stretches a magnificent ridge extending all the way to Mosholu Parkways near Van Cortlandt Park, a distance of four and one quarter miles. Its varied topography, charming views, natural condition and peculiar adaptability for a Grand Boulevard and its location, geographically considered, is in the centre of the upper half of  New York City, where means and access for the entire Metropolis can be furnished. The location is selected on top of an almost continuous crest and the solution of the most difficult question, how to cross the Concourse without interfering with the unimpeded use of it is by constructing transverse roads under the same.” 

Map: Map of the 23rd and 24th Wards, New York, compiled for an index to volumes of Important Maps. (1888-1897) / E. Robinson