The Changing Shoreline of New York City
Manhattan below City Hall is 50% larger than in the 1620s. Maps show the Heere Gracht canal (1626-1676), English water lots that added 500 acres by 1776, Castle Clinton built 300 feet offshore in 1808, Egbert Viele’s 1865 map showing landfill extent, Battery Park City’s 92 acres from World Trade Center excavation (1968-1976), and T. Kennard Thomson’s 1911 plan to dam the East River.
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