Clear Stream, Valley Stream

Within the suburban village of Valley Stream is the waterway that gave the village its name and one of its tributaries is Clear Stream, whose name is preserved on a street and school. Nearly the entire course of this brook has been drained and channeled beneath the surface.

At Fir Street the course of the creek appears as an alley owned by the village with a drain that contributes to the watershed of Clear Stream. This undeveloped parcel marks the former aqueduct that provided water to Brooklyn in the 19th century. The actual stream is a few yards to the east, a meandering property line behind backyards where it flowed prior to suburbanization.

Town of Hempstead Parks Tour

When I am not writing about waterways, I make videos on the history of parks. Following up on the State Parks of New York City, and the State Parks of Long Island, here are the Town Parks of Hempstead, the most populated community in this region to the east of NYC.

More than 40 parks appear in this video that describes their geography, history, design, and potential. On the suburban landscape, most residents have their backyards as private green spaces for themselves, their children, and pets. But parks bring people together, forming friendships, and a sense of community. Parks connect people to history and nature. This video explains their importance to the 793,000+ residents of the Town of Hempstead.

Bellmore Creek, Wantagh

Throughout the New York metropolitan area, there are highways that follow the courses of streams, built atop the marshy banks as there were fewer properties to condemn. One such example is Wantagh State Parkway, which follows Bellmore Creek for nearly three miles within the community of Wantagh on Long Island.

The most prominent feature of Bellmore Creek is Twin Lakes Preserve, which appears unspoiled except for the sounds of speeding cars on the parkway behind the line of trees. The ponds are filled with lilies, creating an impressionistic scene that is a short walk for many residents of Wantagh.

Milburn Creek, Baldwin

Some of Long Island’s hidden streams flow through state parks (Valley Stream), and others flow alongside highways that share the name (Meadowbrook). But a truly hidden stream doesn’t have such counterparts to put in on the map. This is the story of Milburn Creek, which flows for three and a half miles on the south shore of Nassau County. Along the way, it flows past the backyards of Roosevelt, Baldwin, and Freeport.

In this scene near the headwaters of the creek, we are looking upstream at Westbrook Lane and Brookside Avenue on the border of Roosevelt and Baldwin. The stream emerges a block to the north where the eastbound ramp of the Southern State Parkway touches on Brookside Avenue.

Glen Cove Creek, Glen Cove

On Long Island, there are various units of local government: villages, towns, and cities. A town can have more people than a city. These are merely legal designations bestowed by the state to describe the responsibilities of a municipality. Cities tend to have more say in their governance, and control over schools and utilities. One such city is Glen Cove, built at the head of an inlet on Hempstead Bay in 1668. That inlet is Glen Cove Creek, fed by a stream that originates further inland. In the downtown of Glen Cove that stream is hidden beneath a parking lot.

In recent years plans have been made to transform the tidal section of the creek into an upscale residential district, but the underground section remains hidden from the attention of urban planners. The creek has a boxy ferry terminal with a sail-shaped window that seeks to offer future commuter service to Manhattan and Connecticut.

Hidden Waters of Manhasset

In F. Scott FitzGerald’s classic novel The Great Gatsby, West Egg is the pseudonym for Great Neck and the much more upscale peninsula facing it is East Egg, which in reality is Manhasset, a collection of villages jutting into the Long Island Sound. hidden behind the mansions are brooks and ponds whose names relate to past landowners and their once-sizable estates overlooking Manhasset Bay.

The Leeds Pond Preserve, originally built as the Norwood farm and owned by the Sizer family, was purchased by Herman Goldman, a prominent maritime attorney and tax expert, as a retreat to entertain friends and family.

Hidden Waters of Great Neck, NY

Across the city line from the Queens neighborhood of Little Neck is the Great Neck peninsula of Nassau County. The name Great Neck includes the Village of Great Neck, eight other villages, and a handful of communities that share an upscale appearance with plenty of woodland and backyard space where hidden waters flow between the properties. Each stream has its own history that relates to the story of Great Neck.

In particular, one unnamed creek flows a couple of blocks from my uncle’s house and after a few visits, I followed it from its source to the sea.

East Meadow Brook, Merrick

On my childhood trips from Queens to Jones Beach, my family drove on the Meadowbrook State Parkway. The highway’s 12.5-mile route runs mostly through a thickly forested landscape before the trees give way to the salt meadows of the south shore.

The forest on the highway’s shoulders gives the impression of wilderness, but behind it are thousands of tract houses built during the 1950s suburban housing boom. Also not visible from the highway is its namesake stream, East Meadow Brook, which also shares its name with a nearby suburban community. One place where motorists can see it is at the Merrick Road cloverleaf, where it appears as a tidal inlet.

Mill River, Hempstead NY

Having previously visited West Hempstead and its Pine Stream, I followed up with its parent municipality of Hempstead, which has Mill River running beneath its town center flowing towards Hempstead Lake State Park and into Hewlett Bay. In part on account of the destruction caused by Hurricane Sandy in October 2012, Mill River is the centerpiece of the state’s Living with the Bay plan which seeks to restore sections of this stream and make its watershed more resilient in reducing storm damage.

Above is a view of this stream emerging to the surface from a culvert at Tyler Avenue and Peninsula Boulevard. Although it hardly looks like a river, this creek played a vital role in the development of Hempstead and in its future in managing storm runoff.