Apart from the most well known islands that make up New York City — Manhattan, Long Island, and Staten Island, the city is also comprised of dozens of other islands, a large number of them completely uninhabitable. A new drone video has just captured one of them, the North Brother Island, which is located in the East River between the Bronx and Rikers Island.
The island was first home to the Riverside Hospital, which relocated there from Roosevelt Island. It was created to treat smallpox patients and subsequently for other quarantinable diseases, but it is perhaps most well known for being the place where Typhoid Mary (Mary Mallon) was isolated for several decades until her death in 1938. In subsequent decades, the island served as housing for WWII vets, and then as a treatment center for drug addicts. By the 1960s, a decline in patients eventually led to the island being shuttered to the public.
And it has remained that way since. Now home to a bird sanctuary, the island is still populated by several hospital buildings that are in different stages of ruin. A Disneyland-style park was imagined for this island a couple of years ago, but that proposal hasn’t moved forward since. The island is currently owned by the city, and this new video produced by DCE IT gives viewers a bird’s eye view of the abandoned buildings, and the lush greenery surrounding it.
- Drones Explore Abandoned/Off-Limits NYC Island [Reddit]
- A 30-Photo Tour of the Abandoned North Brother Island [Curbed]
- Get To Know 34 of New York City's Most Obscure Islands [Curbed]
- Exploring the East River's Lush, Lonely North Brother Island [Curbed]