Great Kills Park

Great Kills Park in Great Kills, Staten Island, is a part of the Staten Island unit of Gateway National Recreation Area. Part of the National Park System, it covers an area of approximately 580acre of salt marsh, beach and woodlands, stretching along two miles (3 km) of Staten Island's south shore.AccessThe park's main entrance is at Hylan Boulevard and Buffalo Street. On Hylan Boulevard, many MTA buses operate. The Staten Island Railway station Bay Terrace is near the main entrance. With a boat or jet ski, the park can be reached via Great Kills Harbor.HistoryIn 1860, the businessman and pioneering naturalist John J. Crooke bought a part of the land and lived in a wooden house at the beach. In 1916, severe erosion cut the narrow spit of land and Crooke's Point became an island to itself. In 1929, New York City bought Crooke's Point and adjacent land and started to build a public park. Due to the Great Depression and World War II, the work was delayed and the park could not be opened to the public until 1949. It became part of the Gateway National Recreation Area in 1973, along with Miller Field and Fort Wadsworth on Staten Island, Jamaica Bay in Brooklyn and Queens, and Sandy Hook in New Jersey.