McKenna Square, Urban park in Washington Heights, Upper Manhattan, United States
McKenna Square is a small urban park located on the median of West 165th Street between Audubon and Amsterdam Avenues in Upper Manhattan. The space features a raised central pavilion constructed of steel and stone, with granite paths winding through plantings of London plane trees.
The city honored a soldier who died in World War I's Battle of Argonne Forest by naming the park after him in 1924. The location sits along the historical route of the Croton Aqueduct system, which carried water to New York City from sources to the north.
The name comes from an Irish immigrant neighborhood that occupied this location in the early 1900s, where working families lived in simple cottages. Today, the park reflects the area's transformation from a residential community into a green space that serves the surrounding neighborhood.
The park is easily accessible and provides a quiet spot to pause along the busy West 165th Street corridor. The raised design makes it visible from the street level, and the pathways are open for visitors to walk through the space.
The park sits atop the path of one of the city's most ambitious engineering projects from an earlier era, an underground water system that transformed how the city functioned. Few visitors realize they are standing above infrastructure that solved a major urban problem of its time.
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