Trailhead

A park ranger and young visitor; photo by J. Wickersty

This is the trailhead of a trail that encircles the West Pond, one of the original features of the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge, which opened to the public in 1953. In 1950, a fire occurred along the Long Island Railroad's cross-bay trestle to the Rockaway peninsula. This disaster ultimately led to a reconstruction project in which the line became a part of the city's mass transit system. Never missing an opportunity, Robert Moses also had the construction teams build two freshwater ponds next to the railroad line - an East Pond of about 100 acres and a West Pond of approximately 45 acres. Moses had achieved his goal, creating a wildlife sanctuary in the middle of the strongly disputed Jamaica Bay.