What if I were to tell you that there is an abandoned New York island between Queens and the Bronx? With a city that is populated with millions of people, how could there be anything, especially an island, that is completely abandoned? The island is called North Brother Island, and one Reddit user came across the island when kayaking from Connecticut to New York. The pictures he took of the abandoned island near NYC are absolutely amazing, and it still blows my mind that this island is unoccupied. Lucky for us, he decided to stop and take a few pictures of this island.
North Brother is located between the Bronx and Queens.
The island was developed in 1885. It was originally used to build a hospital complex.
They used the hospital to quarantine patients who had small pox or typhoid fever.
In the 1950’s, they changed the hospital into a rehabilitation center for patients who were addicted to drugs.
The entire island has been abandoned since 1963, which makes it even more crazy that it hasn’t been developed into something new, especially with its close proximity to New York City.
They did try to sell the island to investors in the 1970’s but there were no buyers.
In order to develop the island, they had to take into account the cost of construction, how they would get materials there, the cost of a sewage system, plus the noise from La Guardia Airport.
In the 1980’s, they considered building a prison on the island, but it was cheaper to build it in Upstate New York.
The island is slowly taking back the land that was used, one inch at a time.
Some of these pictures are absolutely crazy.
I can only imagine how much this place was used decades ago.
The toilets were running at one time, but over the years have become unusable.
One of the old nursing stations.
An old X-ray machine.
The old radiator heaters.
The pictures below were all artwork done by patients in the 1950’s.
This is the top of an elevator shaft.
This is the view that the tallest building on the island has of Manhattan. What an amazing view!
Old food supplies like dried up ketchup and other condiments.
A view from outside of one the buildings.
An old fire hydrant slowly being engulfed by nature.
The tree seems to have grown around this old rotten and rusted staircase.
I still can’t get over how close this abandoned island is to NYC and most people don’t even know about it.
They had everything they needed on this island, including a tennis court which has since been overgrown.
Are those bullet holes in that door? I wonder what the story is behind those!
Even the old signage was left behind, giving this place an eerie feeling.
Would you willingly explore this abandoned island? I don’t know if I would, but I’m sure glad that someone did so we can see all the amazing things that have been left behind.