Providing
more access to a great urban waterfront and reclaiming marine and plant life
does more than revitalize the environment—it renews a part of ourselves. That’s how I felt
when I visited Muscota Marsh, a new public
green space at an acre of land at the northeast tip of Inwood Hill Park in
upper Manhattan.
I
came across an article on this small but delightful park by Andrea Stone in the Summer 2014 issue of Columbia, the quarterly magazine
sent to all alumni of Columbia University.
The park lies at the western edge of Baker Athletic
Complex. A few weekends ago, after watching a loss on the gridiron, I walked out of the
stadium, down a gravel path, and gloried in the mid-afternoon sunshine as I
beheld the nearby Spuyten Duyvil and more distant Palisades across the Hudson
River. I took this photograph that afternoon.
Columbia’s
crew team long knew this site Boathouse Marsh because of the facility kept nearby, but its current name constitutes a reclamation of history just as the site
represents a reclamation of nature. “Muscota” comes from “place in the reeds,” a
phrase from the Lenape, the Native Americans who once lived here.
More
than the great blue heron, the snowy egret, and leopard frogs are visiting this
site. As seen here, human beings are taking to it, too.
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