Gorman Park (or Amelia Gorman Park) is a park in Washington Heights,

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. It is bounded by Broadway on the west and Wadsworth Terrace on the east and stretches from 188th to 190th Streets. The land rises more than a hundred feet in a steep incline from Broadway to Wadsworth Terrace. The park features a path that winds upward among trees. However, the park and stairs have been closed since 2020, with the exception of the upper plaza, due to the city's delay in beginning a reconstruction project. The park is dedicated to a mother and daughter, Gertie Amelia Gorman and Gertie Emily Gorman. Gertie Emily Gorman and Charles Webb (a real estate investor and Yale graduate) had been married for less than a year when she died on September 25, 1923. Many of Gorman's relatives and friends suspected that Webb had poisoned his wife, though a

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investigation did not find evidence of such poisoning. For five years Gorman's will was disputed. A will dated August 21, 1923, left her entire estate to her husband and superseded a will that would have divided the proceeds among her relatives. Webb donated two acres of land to the city in 1929 in honor of both his wife and her mother. A stone wall features an inscription dedicating the park to "Gertie A. Gorman," as his wife had wished. In 2011 the park became the focus of a local

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and land use dispute when Quadriad Realty Partners proposed to build new residential towers taller than the by-right zoning rules permit on a vacant lot adjacent to the park in exchange for adding land to the park and thoroughly renovating it. The park has been closed except the upper plaza since 2020. A capital reconstruction project has been on hold for two years, which the

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attributes to

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delays (as of November, 2022). The project design begin in November 2019, and was completed a year later than projected, in June 2022. Funding of $2,163,000 was procured by October 2021. The projected start date for construction is March 2023.

References

Parks in Manhattan Washington Heights, Manhattan {{Manhattan-geo-stub