New York City 2023 | Weekday Walk | Financial District

My walk began at Battery Park subway station and ended at Fulton Centre subway station.

Battery Park has great views over the river and it’s always exciting to see Lady Liberty. Castle Clinton may not look like much, but in 1855 it became New York’s first immigration processing centre. Over eight million new arrivals, a full two-thirds of those who came to the United States at this time, spent their first few hours here.

Bowling Green Park was the city’s first official park, established in 1733, and although it looks rather sparse, it’s an open space that has survived for almost three hundred years in a city that is constantly building. Fraunces Tavern is the place where George Washington delivered his famous Farewell to the Troops and where Alexander Hamilton set up his first Office of the Treasury. Sadly this is not the original building, having been reconstructed in 1904.

74 Wall Street was once the largest slave market in the United States, a bastion of inhumanity that held more auctions than any other in the U.S. Forty Wall Street was supposed to be the tallest building in the world in 1929. Once it was finished, the architect of the Chrysler Building in midtown revealed the Art Deco spire he had been hiding in the elevator shaft and thus added an unbeatable 125 feet to claim the title of tallest building in the world.

Fearless Girl, facing the New York Stock Exchange, is a bronze statue of a young girl, fists on hips. She’s a statement on the need for more women working in finance.

One Wall Street is a stunning Art Deco building and once one of the most expensive addresses in the city. The building is currently being converted in to private residences. A quick look at the website revealed that a studio, just 677 square feet, is available for $1,130,000 and should you fancy a three bed with terrace, that’s yours for $10,500,000. Trinity Church, at the top of Wall Street, is considered to be the best Gothic Revival church in the United States. The graveyard is worth a wander through, as the remains of Alexander Hamilton are here.

The 9/11 Memorial Plaza covers 8 acres and features two reflecting pools and waterfalls. Each pool is surrounded by a brass parapet where the names of the victims of both the 9/11 and February 1993 bombings are engraved and arranged in order according to where they worked, close to their friends and co-workers.

Michele Beale was a director with Risk Waters and was attending a conference she had organised at the World Trade Centre. She had also wanted The Brainy One to attend the conference as a guest speaker. However, they were unable to agree on the fee and The Brainy One remained in London.

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Step count that day | 27,855.