Metropolitan Avenue

Metropolitan Avenue is the name of three streets in New York City. The main Metropolitan Avenue is a major east-west street in Queens and northern Brooklyn; its western end is at the East River in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and the eastern end at Jamaica Avenue in Jamaica, Queens. There are also Metropolitan Avenues in Staten Island and the Bronx.

Originally an Indian trail, Metropolitan Avenue was constructed in 1816 as the Williamsburgh and Jamaica Turnpike, a toll road which connected the then villages of Williamsburgh (as it was originally spelled) and Jamaica, New York. The road became a farmer's and stage coach route to the Williamsburgh ferries across the East River to Manhattan. The easternmost segment of the present avenue in Williamsburg initially had several names before it was joined to Metropolitan Avenue circa 1858: Bushwick Street, then Woodhull Street, and, later, North Second Street. The City of Brooklyn acquired Metropolitan Avenue from the Williamsburgh and Jamaica Turnpike Road Company in 1872. Several of the neighborhoods through which it passes originated as villages along its length.

Metropolitan Avenue runs mainly through the neighborhoods of Williamsburg and East Williamsburg in Brooklyn and Ridgewood, Maspeth, Middle Village, Glendale, Forest Hills, Kew Gardens, Richmond Hill and Jamaica in Queens. The avenue, which ranges between four and six lanes wide, marks the northern borders of Ridgewood and Glendale and the southern border of Maspeth; it also splits Middle Village and passes through Forest Park. The street is 7.9 miles (12.7 km) long.

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