Urban Archive

Between 1924 and 1929, sixteen blocks of Hudson Brick row houses and co-op apartments rose along the edge of the Sunnyside train yards. The development, called Sunnyside Gardens, was inspired by the Garden City movement, the brainchild of English planner Ebenezer Howard.

Only 30 percent of the land was developed, the rest was reserved as shared green space. Instead of private yards, residents enjoyed communal courtyards running between rows of houses. Garages were located on the neighborhood’s periphery. At its border, they built Sunnyside Gardens Park, still the largest private park in New York City.

When the 40-year deed covenants expired in the mid-1960s, some owners rushed to add driveways, decks, fences, and even swimming pools. To preserve its character, the city designated Sunnyside Gardens a Special Planned Community Preservation District, one of only four in New York, along with Fresh Meadows, the Harlem River Houses, and Parkchester, making new alterations illegal without a special permit.

Finally, in 2007, after years of contentious back-and-forth among residents, the neighborhood was officially landmarked.

The Neighborhoods

Sunnyside

Sunnyside in Queens, between the Sunnyside Rail Yard and the LIE/BQE interchange, is bisected by Queens Boulevard, with the great, curving vaults of the elevated train tracks running above. To the south, the buildings are a mix of five- and six-story co-ops and freestanding homes, while the north is dominated by the historic district of Sunnyside Gardens, a leafy enclave of red-brick Colonial Revival homes and apartment buildings. The neighborhood's eastern border is made up of Woodside and Calvary Cemetery, while its western border is (by most accounts) 39th Street. Not to be confused with 39th Place, which, in true Queens fashion, runs one block parallel. The neighborhood got its name from the Broucard family, French Huguenots who arrived in the U.S. in 1675 aboard the Gilded Otter. Bourgon Broucard initially settled in Bushwick, but, perhaps growing weary of all the bespoke cooperages and farm-to-table johnnycake pop-ups, he bought a large estate in what is now Sunnyside from the fantastically named Burger Jorizz. In 1713, Broucard, or one of his sons, named their estate "Sunnyside Hill." One of the homes that Bourgon built stood for over 200 years before it was finally torn down around 1900. By then the farmland was giving way to the city: the Queensboro Bridge was completed in 1909, and the IRT Flushing Line, connecting Queens with Manhattan, was finished by 1915.