Gateway National Recreation Area

One early morning while we were in New York, I drove out to the New York side of Gateway National Recreation Area. I wanted to walk the trails and spend some time watching the birds at the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge.

What struck me was its location. This is not a remote National Park site. Jamaica Bay is within New York City, surrounded by neighborhoods, highways, and airports, yet within the refuge are salt marshes, ponds, open water, grasses, and trails that provide habitat for an extraordinary variety of birds and other wildlife.

Jamaica Bay sits along the Atlantic Flyway, one of the major migration routes used by birds traveling along the eastern coast of North America. More than 300 species have been recorded in the Jamaica Bay area. Depending on the season, visitors may see herons, egrets, ducks, geese, shorebirds, raptors, and many other migrating species.

Walking the trail early in the morning was a wonderful way to experience this part of Gateway. The trails take you through the refuge and provide opportunities to stop and watch the birds feeding and moving through the wetlands. It felt surprisingly removed from the city surrounding it.

The refuge is only one part of the much larger Gateway National Recreation Area. The park encompasses areas in both New York and New Jersey, including Jamaica Bay, Staten Island, and Sandy Hook. Congress established Gateway National Recreation Area on October 27, 1972, creating one of the country’s first major urban national recreation areas. Its creation recognized that people living in large cities should also have access to protected natural landscapes, recreation, and historic places.

I enjoyed being out early, walking the trail and looking for birds as the day began. Although relatively small compared with many of the National Park landscapes, I have visited, Jamaica Bay provides something particularly valuable, a protected natural refuge within one of the largest urban areas in the country.