Photography: Random Roosevelt Island 9/4/25

Photography: Random Roosevelt Island 9/4/25

Roosevelt Island, NY: While JOVM was on hiatus, I wound up with a lot of unexpected free time on my hands. Honestly, that’s not a great thing for me. So, I tried to keep busy whenever I could.

Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site over the years, you’d know that I’ve periodically headed out to Roosevelt Island for long, photo-driven walks. Oddly enough, a couple of years had passed since I had previously stepped foot on the island. With that in mind, it was an opportunity to capture some images with my trusty Canon R6 Mark II.

Roosevelt Island has always been an odd place: In the 1800s, it was home to several hospitals and a prison, including famously, Renwick Smallpox Hospital, which has been in ruins since the 60s or so. For a decade, it was a ghost town until housing developments were built in the 1970s. Verizon and Cornell have built tech/engineering incubator campuses in the last handful of years, adding gleaming futuristic buildings to brutalist-looking architecture on two incredibly narrow streets.

Cornell’s and Verizon’s campuses, whether directly or indirectly, have led to the series of newer developments that have popped up in the past couple o years or so. They’re so new to me, that for a brief moment, I was confused and briefly couldn’t figure out where a familiar location was — or if it still existed.

There’s the Roosevelt Island Tramway, which if you’re if you’re scared of heights, like I am, can seem — well, terrifying. It’s really high. And there’s a lot of East River. You have some of the most gorgeous views of the Manhattan skyline, the 59th Street Bridge (not Queensboro or Ed Koch) and of Queens around.

There’s a Tom Otterness series on the Manhattan side of the island. A small lighthouse is on the north side of the island. There’s a small, guerrilla-styled art gallery in a dusty, parking garage, which feeds directly into the Roosevelt Island Bridge back to Queens.

And there are a surprising amount of Canada geese around. Some of them have picked up an “oh yeah, fuck you, pal!” attitude towards both humans and cars. They fit right in . . .

It’s technically Manhattan but some essential services are done from Queens, and yet it’s neither. Like I said, odd. But photogenic all the same. 

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