A few strange facts and stories that even a seasoned New Yorker might not know.
• There are more than 2,000 bridges in New York City. Two of them are retractile, meaning they can slide open or even be pulled ashore to let ships through.
• The life-size bronze elephant that stands in the United Nations Sculpture Garden on 46th Street was given to the U.N. in 1998 by the governments of Kenya, Namibia, and Nepal. But the anatomically correct animal sports a two-foot long…um…appendage. Today, plants strategically hide the controversial body part, but sadly, the garden is closed. You can still glimpse his front quarters from the street, though.
• Why are water towers and tanks so common on the rooftops of New York buildings? Because a water code from the 19th century specifies that all New York City buildings over six stories must have individual water storage enough to douse a fire above the sixth floor. Aqueducts and water pressure can take care of the first six floors; the amount of extra water and the size of the tank are commensurate with the number of extra floors.
• You can’t fly directly to California from LaGuardia Airport. A Perimeter Rule set by the Port Authority limits the number of miles an airplane can fly nonstop out of LaGuardia. Maximum: 1,500. After Flushing airport closed in 1984, most of its traffic was diverted to LaGuardia, so the Port Authority instituted the Perimeter Rule to avoid overcrowding. Two exceptions: 1) There is no cap on Saturday, and 2) the rule doesn’t apply to flights to Denver (just over 1,700 miles) and some parts of the Caribbean—because nonstops from LaGuardia to those places were allowed before the rule was made.
• The next total solar eclipse visible from New York will happen on May 1, 2079.
In 1918 cartoonist Robert Ripley introduced his “Believe It or Not” feature in the New York Globe.