Running tour · Manhattan

Island of the Lighthouse

3.4 mi run

Open in Stride Stories

The stories on this route

1. Roosevelt Island Tramway

   Watch a cabin glide in at ground level here, then climb toward the Manhattan towers. This is the Roosevelt Island Tramway, and it was only ever supposed to be temporary.

2. Blackwell House

   Look at the small white clapboard farmhouse with the front porch on slim columns. Next to the towers around it, it looks tiny. It's the oldest structure on Roosevelt Island, and among the oldest houses in the city.

3. The Octagon

   Look at the eight-sided grey stone tower with the domed roof and the double staircase at its door. This was the main entrance of the New York City Lunatic Asylum, one of the first institutions of its kind in the country. It was designed by Alexander Jackson Davis and opened in 1839.

4. Blackwell Island Lighthouse

   Look at the small grey stone tower at the very tip of the island, with the glass lantern on top. It's about fifty feet tall, built of rough grey stone quarried on the island, mostly by convicts from the penitentiary. It has the strength and character of a medieval fortification.

5. Smallpox Hospital ruin

   Look at the roofless grey stone shell behind the fence, with its pointed arches and battlements. This was the Smallpox Hospital, and for many years New York City's only such institution.

6. Four Freedoms Park

   Look down the long lawn, with lines of linden trees narrowing to the point. This is Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Park, a four-acre memorial to the Four Freedoms from his 1941 State of the Union address.

Stories researched October 2026 · every fact checked against a source