Union Square Apartments

Streets History

Union Square is located from 14th Street to 17th Street, between Broadway and Park Avenue, New York City, NY.

The history of the current square goes back to the approval of the gridiron plan of Manhattan in 1811. Since this date, Union Square is an important and historic intersection in Manhattan because it became the place where the two major thoroughfares of the island united: Broadway and Fourth Avenue (then Bloomingdale Road and Bowery Road).

In the early 1800's, upscale townhouses and local theaters thrived in the area surrounding Union Square. In the 1850's and 1860's, factories and offices replaced the residences, and unionists and abolitionists held massive rallies here. In the 1920's, labor activists gathered, protested and rioted.

In 1939 a fenced park with a central fountain was created at the center of the square but the following decade represented the heyday of the square when affluent citizens came to live around the park. In 1872 the renowned landscape architects Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux - of Central Park fame - redesigned Union Square Park.

After being known for its drug dealers, things started to change in 1976 with the creation of the Greenmarket, a market with fresh produce. Today, Union Square is a lovely park in the centerpiece of a chic neighborhood brimming with restaurants, upscale shops and retail giants where you can admire the impressive equestrian statue of U.S President George Washington, modeled by Henry Kirke Brown and unveiled in 1856.

The square is surrounded by the Flatiron District to the north, Chelsea to the west, Greenwich Village to the southwest, East Village to the southeast and Gramercy to the east.