Manhattan Island, commonly referred to as “The City,” is amazing, but I am not talking about the usual reasons people love New York City. Most visitors are captivated by the beautiful skyline, exciting nightlife, Broadway shows, world-class restaurants, and the 24-hour frenzy of Times Square. However, I am personally fascinated by the extraordinary vision it took to build NYC. It’s hard to picture that three hundred years ago, this small island lay quiet, a piece of relatively flat rock filled with pine thickets, wildlife, and Native Americans. Today, massive skyscrapers seem to rise out of the Hudson and East Rivers, towering over the landscape. Today’s Manhattan did not exist until the human mind saw more.
Yet there is an intriguing twist to this story. Regardless of how transcendent New York City’s visionaries were, its mighty skyscrapers would have crumbled if they were not built on a solid foundation. This foundation is as remarkable as the towering buildings it supports. The east coast of the United States is lined with sandbars, inland waterways, and barrier islands barely suited for a modest home, much less a hundred-story skyscraper. But Manhattan Island is one of the few eastern coastal areas composed of rock. New York City is built on a geological wonder, unique to the northeast coast. Manhattan Schist is one of the densest types of rock formation in the world. This foundation makes all of New York City’s mighty buildings and infrastructure possible, including sewer, electric, and transportation, which serve millions of New Yorkers every day, with astounding efficiency.
