Roosevelt Island

A quick tramway ride away, a cool place to stroll and enjoy excellent views of Manhattan.

The spooky building in the picture above is the remains of the Smallpox Hospital, a New York City landmark and one of the many hospital buildings of Roosevelt Island, the tiny island between Manhattan and Queens, connected to both by the Queensboro Bridge.

Once you get off the tramway (more on that in the coming post) or the subway, you can choose to take the red bus to go around the island, or walk around as we did. Here are some of the inhabitants of the island:

This island was once home to hospitals, like the Smallpox, the mentally ill asylum, the penitentiary and its hospital, etc. and it was known by the name of Welfare Island. Nowadays, after some rennovations and urban development programs, it is an up and coming residential area (as Wikipedia states, former UN secretary Kofi Annan and actress Sarah Jessica Parker have lived here - even Mae West and Billie Holiday were prisoners in the penitentiary back in the time).

In the southernmost part of the Island, in 2012, the nice Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Park opened. Unfortunately, it was closed on the day we visited so... next time!