300,000

In 1848, the Harlem Line reached “Brewster’s Station.”A rival company began building the Hudson Line in 1835, reaching Albany by 1849. By the early 1850’s the Harlem Line had revenues of one million dollars a year and transported nearly three million passengers at a fare of two and a half cents per mile.

10

10th Ave. was called Death Ave.

1,000

By 1933, 1,000 men had killed 105 street-level rail crossings, and when the elevated track was christened in June 1934, The New York Times reported, “The West Side is coming into its own.”

172

The High Line was the first completed stage of the West Side Improvement, a massive urban infrastructure project undertaken by the New York Central Railroad, in partnership with the City of New York. In later stages, under the stewardship of Robert Moses, the Improvement built platforms over the rail lines north of 72nd Street, expanded Riverside Park on top of them and constructed the Henry Hudson Parkway. The entire Improvement cost more than $175 million in 1930s dollars.

3

1980 the last train ran in 1980 with three carloads of frozen turkeys.

28

1990 as the line lay unused, it became known to a few urban explorers and local residents for the tough, drought-tolerant wild grasses, shrubs, and trees that had sprung up in the gravel along the abandoned railway.

2

In 1999, the non-profit Friends of the High Line was formed by Joshua David and Robert Hammond.

7,500

7,500Signs along the path say the landscape is wild, but it’s actually, according to the High Line Blog, “designed to recall the self-sown landscape that grew up on the High Line after the trains stopped running” with “over 7,500 native grasses and perennials” that peek up between hand-laid tracks and track-like slabs of poured concrete.

36

January – July 2003An open ideas competition, "Designing the High Line," solicits proposals for the High Line's reuse. 720 teams from 36 countries enter. Hundreds of design entries are displayed at Grand Central Terminal.

30

It’s between 18ft and 30ft high.

1.45

The High Line is located on Manhattan's West Side. It runs from Gansevoort Street in the Meatpacking District to West 34th Street, between 10th & 11th Avenues. Section 1 of the High Line, which opened to the public on June 9, 2009, runs from Gansevoort Street to West 20th Street. It is total around 1.45 Miles.