UPPER WEST SIDE

Like the Upper East Side opposite Central Park, the Upper West Side is an affluent, primarily residential area with many of its residents working in commercial areas of Midtown and Lower Manhattan. Similarly to the Museum Mile district on the Upper East Side, the Upper West Side is considered one of Manhattan's cultural and intellectual hubs, with Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts and Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School located at the south end; the American Museum of Natural History and the Rose Center for Earth and Space (formerly the Hayden Planetarium) located near its center and across the street from Central Park; and Columbia University and Barnard College located just to the north of the UWS in Morningside Heights. The Upper West Side is also home to the famous Beacon Theater.

The Upper West Side ranged from the former village of Harsenville, centered on the old Bloomingdale Road (now Broadway) and 65th Street, west to the railroad yards along the Hudson, then north to 110th Street, where the ground rises to Morningside Heights. Development of the neighborhood lagged even while Central Park was being laid out in the 1860s and '70s, but increased with the introduction of the Ninth Avenue “El” train in the late 1870s along Ninth Avenue (renamed Columbus Avenue in 1890), and with Columbia University's relocation to Morningside Heights in the 1890s.

The Upper West Side experienced a building boom from 1885 to 1910, thanks in large part to the 1904 opening of the city's first subway line, which ran under Broadway for the entire length of the neighborhood.  The stately tall apartment blocks on Central Park West and West End Avenue and the townhouses on the streets between Amsterdam Avenue and Riverside Drive, which contribute to the character of the area, were all constructed during the pre-depression years of the twentieth century. And in 1932, the IND Eighth Avenue Line opened under Central Park West, bringing a second artery of fast public transportation to the eastern edge of the Upper West Side.  In 1940 the 9^th Ave. “El” was closed and subsequently torn down, heralding a new vibe for Columbus Avenue.

With the construction of Lincoln Center, the Lincoln Towers apartment complex (which are now all cooperatives), the arrival of the corporate headquarters and expensive condos of the Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle, and the Riverside South apartment complex between 59^th and 72^nd Streets, this part of the Upper West Side is known as Lincoln Square because of the different tone and ambiance than that typically associated with the UWS.