Gateway National Recreation Area

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Gateway National Recreation Area
IUCN Category V (Protected Landscape/Seascape)

Location:	New York & New Jersey, USA
Nearest city:	New York City, New York
Area:	26,607 acres (107.67 km²)
Established:	October 27, 1972
Total Visitation:	8,294,353 (in 2005)
Governing body:	National Park Service

Gateway National Recreation Area is a 26,607 acre (107.67 km²) National Recreation Area in the New York City metropolitan area. It is owned by the United States government and managed by the National Park Service. The park comprises four separate units located in three boroughs of New York City and one county in central New Jersey. Law enforcement is the responsibility of the United States Park Police in the New York units, and of commissioned park rangers in the New Jersey unit. Three of the four units include popular swimming beaches. The area drew more than 8 million visitors in 2005.

Jamaica Bay Unit includes much of the shoreline below the Shore Parkway beginning at Plum Beach and ending at Kennedy International Airport. In addition, several dozen islands in Jamaica Bay, along with the water itself, is designated the only "wildlife refuge" in the National Park System (usually, "wildlife refuges" are a US Fish & Wildlife Service function).

Gateway Jamaica Bay Coastal Landscapes

The bay is a tidal estuary off the southern parts of the boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens. The unit has a visitors center named for William Fitts Ryan (the congressman who championed Gateway's creation) that has been under development for many years at the historic former airport - Floyd Bennett Field. Additional amenities include a number of concessions, including a public stable and equestrian trails, a public marina, and a multi-purpose sports/entertainment complex. A visitor contact station specifically for the wildlife refuge is accessible nearby by automobile and subway, which is within walking distance to the trail system on the main island. This is the only portion of the refuge accessible to the general public. The 9,000-plus acre refuge includes much of the waters and almost all of the remaining marsh islands in Jamaica Bay, which are protected. Access to the other islands is prohibited. This is the only unit that does not have bathing beaches. Fishing, nature-viewing, aviation history, photography, boating, cycling, and sailing are the most popular activities within this unit.

Breezy Point Unit is located in Rockaway, Queens, New York. It stretches to the tip of Rockaway Point and includes Jacob Riis Park and Fort Tilden, each with districts listed in the National Register of Historic Places. It preserves, in part, some of the last remaining natural dunes in the area, and is home to at least two endangered species (piping plover, and beach tiger beetle). The life-guarded beach and historic Bath House area in the summer months receive most of this unit's annual visitation. Fishing, swimming, nature-viewing, cycling, and sunbathing are the most popular activities.

Staten Island Unit is located on the south shore of Staten Island within Lower New York Bay. It includes Fort Wadsworth, an historic collection of masonry fortifications on the site of much earlier fortifications; Miller Field, an historic former airfield south of New Dorp; as well as Great Kills Park on Great Kills Harbor - which includes a marina concession. Also within this unit are Hoffman and Swinburne Island. Organized sports, nature-viewing, sailing, boating, sunbathing and military history are the most popular activities.

Sandy Hook Unit is in Monmouth County in northern New Jersey. The barrier peninsula Sandy Hook is home to the historic former Fort Hancock, as well as the oldest continuously operating lighthouse in America (1764). The unit also includes Gunnison Beach, a "Nude beach" by custom. Ferries from Manhattan in New York are available in season. Sunbathing, swimming, fishing, cycling, nature-viewing, and military history are the most popular activities.