NYC Neighborhoods: Hell's Kitchen

JANUARY 23, 2012

This West Midtown neighborhood has a new lease on life, with a heavenly location near business and theater and a new wave of loyal residents. . .

The New York City neighborhood that stretches between 34th Street and 59th Street, from 8th Avenue west to the Hudson River, is known as both Hell's Kitchen and Clinton--and its history provides reasons for both.

Hell's Kitchen was a rough and gritty page in the New York storybook from the 1920s through the 1980s. Clashes between rival gangs were the stuff of legend—and the neighborhood was the setting for the gang romance West Side Story.

But by the 1990s the area was on its way to a makeover. New condominium towers--like William Zeckendorf’s Worldwide Plaza (shown), a full-block complex built in the late 1980s--became a magnet for both top businesses and residents. Renovated row houses and community gardens grew on neglected tenement blocks, and the crime-ridden waterfront became part of Hudson River Park. Today, to better serve the growing community, subway service is being brought to the far west side. The MTA has started its project to extend the number 7 line to the neighborhood, with a new station at 34th Street and 11th Avenue.

Although Hell’s Kitchen has been re-named Clinton—for the city’s 19th century governor DeWitt Clinton—in an attempt to relegate its former reputation to history, many locals still embrace the original moniker with pride.

(See also “The Transformation of Eighth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan Almost Complete.”)