How Coney Island's beach became public

The story of who owned Coney Island's sand, from a 1654 deed to a 2025 casino vote, and how the beach became public.

The beach, boardwalk and Steeplechase Pier from the air, taken between 1917 and 1964 (National Archives) · National Archives (photographer unknown) · Public domain

Coney Island's beach became public because New York State went to court and the city took title to the land. In 1912 the state sued amusement owners over the beach, and in 1913 a court ruled it belonged to the state. On October 1, 1921, the city took title to the shore and broke ground on the boardwalk. Before that, private owners had split up the waterfront and fenced off parts of the sand.

The story of Steeplechase, Luna Park and Dreamland is on the main Coney Island Beach page.

Where does the name Coney Island come from?

Nobody knows for sure. Wikipedia says no theory has strong evidence. The most popular one points to the Dutch word for rabbit.

Dutch maps labeled the sand spit Conyne Eylandt, starting with the 1639 Manatus map. The same map marks a Munsee village named Techkonis. The word history site WordOrigins.org says it may be the source of the “konis” sound, but nothing else is known about that village.

The English name Conyne Island appears as early as May 7, 1654, in a deed. That deed passed the island from the Lenape to settlers of the town of Gravesend. It records the Lenape name narriockh as meaning simply “the island.” Wikipedia says it may mean “land without shadows.” WordOrigins calls that translation spurious.

One other story does not hold up. John Colman, a crewman of Henry Hudson, did die on Coney Island in 1609, but nothing ties him to the name.

In 1679 to 1680, a Dutch journal said: “Nobody lives upon it, but it is used in winter for keeping cattle, horses, oxen, hogs and others.”

When did Coney Island stop being an island?

Coney Island is now a peninsula, but the change happened in steps over many years. In 1750 the Jamaica Ditch was dug through Coney Hook, which split the area into separate islands. That ditch is the start of Coney Island Creek.

In 1824 a company built the first bridge across the ditch, linking the island to the mainland. In the 1830s and 1840s, carriage roads and steamships cut the trip from half a day to two hours.

Then the creek was filled in, piece by piece. Wikipedia says landowners had filled part of the creek by 1924, that Belt Parkway work in the 1930s filled more, and that more fill was added in 1962 for the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge. Because the filling took decades, sources date the change differently, so no single year fits.

What were the first hotels and resorts like?

Wikipedia calls the Coney Island House the first hotel on the island. Its founding date is disputed. NYC Parks' historical sign says 1824. Wikipedia says 1829.

More visitors came as the trip got easier. In 1847 a ferry line to Norton's Point started, and the middle class began to come. Wikipedia says the first railroad reached the island in 1864. By 1904, five railroads served the island.

Big hotels grew at the east end. William Engeman built a resort at Brighton Beach in 1868. In April 1888 the Brighton Beach Hotel was moved 495 feet inland on railroad tracks. The move took nine days. Wikipedia calls it the largest building relocation of the 19th century.

Further east, Austin Corbin built Manhattan Beach. A local history site, Heart of Coney Island, says the town of Gravesend sold him about 500 acres of shoreline for $1,500, or about $3 an acre. In 1895 Corbin added a concrete cycling track for 12,000 people, built for $30,000. Corbin barred Jewish guests from his hotel, and Wikipedia says the policy ended after his death.

One odd building was the Elephantine Colossus, a hotel shaped like an elephant. It was reported to cost $65,000. Its size is disputed. Wikipedia says 122 feet and seven stories. The Brooklyn Public Library says twelve stories with 31 rooms.

Who ran Coney Island in the Gravesend years?

John Y. McKane was the boss of the town of Gravesend, which sold shoreline on Coney Island. Most of what follows comes from Heart of Coney Island, a local history site, so treat the numbers as its account.

The site says McKane's construction company was credited with building nearly two-thirds of the buildings in Coney Island and Gravesend. In the 1893 election his political organization turned in 2,700 votes in a town with 1,700 registered voters. When Republican poll watchers came with a court injunction, McKane told them: “Injunctions don't go here!” In 1894 he was sentenced to six years in Sing Sing for election fraud. He died in 1899, the site says.

Robert Moses, the city's parks chief, gave his own blunt view in a recorded speech in the 1950s. He said Coney had been “town land owned by the people, given away to crooks for a song.”

How did the fenced beach become public?

The 1913 ruling did not settle everything. When an appeals court upheld it in 1916, it made an exception for part of Steeplechase Park. The boardwalk then opened in stages. A first section opened in October 1922. An extension to West 17th Street followed that December. The last stretch, from West 17th to West 37th Street, opened on May 15, 1923.

Sources differ on the cost. NYC Parks' sign puts the beach work and boardwalk at $3 million. Wikipedia says the boardwalk and related projects cost $20 million in all.

Parks took over the boardwalk in 1938. Wikipedia quotes Robert Moses saying that city beaches and boardwalks “were never properly planned.” In a 1950s speech, Moses said that when the city took over Coney Island in 1937, it had only about 50 acres of shrinking, overcrowded beach. “Often at high tide there was no beach at all,” he said.

What were the crowded years like?

The subway made Coney Island a nickel trip. New York subway fares stayed at five cents from 1904 to 1948, according to the Barry Popik blog. An Atlas Obscura line says the fare to Coney Island dropped from ten cents to five in 1920. That clashes with the fare history. The 1920 date is when the BMT subway reached Coney Island.

The cheap ride changed the east end. Wikipedia says the new subway made day trips easy and led to the closing of the Brighton Beach Hotel in 1924. Fortune magazine wrote in 1938 that this “Nickel Empire” peaked in the mid-1920s. Still, NYC Parks says that even in the Great Depression, Coney Island drew millions of visitors.

In July 1932 a fire that the Brooklyn Paper says is considered the worst in Coney Island's history burned 100 feet of the boardwalk. Thousands of bathers ran out of the burning bathhouses and were left on the beach without their clothes. Historian Charles Denson blames children playing with matches.

What happened after World War II?

In the 1940s and 1950s, the city's plans for Coney Island turned to housing and a new aquarium. Robert Moses pushed both. On April 2, 1953, the New York Times reported that he had proposed rezoning Coney Island for homes.

The aquarium needed a new home because Moses wanted the old one gone. In 1941 he called the Battery Park aquarium “an ugly wart on the main axis leading straight to the Statue of Liberty.” WNYC says the Battery Park aquarium closed on October 1, 1941. It also says the cornerstone at Coney Island was laid in 1954 and the aquarium reopened in 1957. The website 6sqft says Moses moved it to the old Dreamland site in 1947. WNYC's dates show the aquarium did not open there until 1957.

Housing towers rose where amusements had stood. A neighborhood guide lists the Coney Island Houses in 1956 and the Warbasse Houses in 1966. In 1974 the housing group CHPC wrote a report in response to a court order to desegregate Mark Twain Junior High School. It argued that the whole neighborhood had to be made more attractive. Bobby Nagy, in an oral history, remembered 1970s Coney Island as “dirty and scary and rough,” yet still alluring.

Astroland kept rides running. It opened in 1962 on 3.1 acres. Wikipedia says an early-morning fire on July 12, 1975 wiped out much of the park, and it was rebuilt. Dick Zigun, a founder of Coney Island USA, recalled that owner Jerry Albert bragged Astroland had “not one light bulb burned out.” The Albert family sold Astroland to Thor Equities in 2006.

What has happened since 2009?

The fights since 2009 have been about who controls the land between Surf Avenue and the boardwalk. Charles Denson, a Coney Island historian, said in 2016 about his Steeplechase demolition exhibit: “To me the real business in Coney Island has always been real estate.”

On July 29, 2009, the City Council approved a rezoning of the amusement district. It made a 27-acre amusement district, but kept only 12 acres for outdoor rides. The rest could hold indoor amusements and up to four hotels. On November 25, 2009, the Save Coney Island coalition sued, saying the plan favored Thor Equities. The city bought much of the amusement zone from Thor's Joe Sitt for $100 million, and Thor kept about four acres. The city gave a 10-year lease to Zamperla and Central Amusement International. In 2010 Central Amusement International, now the landlord, ordered Ruby's Bar and eight other boardwalk businesses to leave by November 15.

Hurricane Sandy hit in October 2012. The Army Corps of Engineers says the elevated beach avoided an estimated $494 million in damage to houses and structures during the storm. Marine Technology Reporter says the surge also pushed sand and water over the boardwalk, and the beach lost 600,000 cubic yards of sand. In 2013 the Corps placed about 580,000 cubic yards of sand to return the beach to the shape the Corps had designed for it. In September 2022 the Army Corps released a draft flood plan for New York and parts of New Jersey. The plan is priced at $52 billion for the whole region. The Coney Island History Project says it would raise the boardwalk five feet with what appears to be a wide concrete walkway that acts as a surge barrier. A 2022 post from the History Project says construction would begin in 2030. We found no report on the plan's status after early 2023.

The most recent fight we found was over a casino. The Coney was a $3 billion plan beside the boardwalk, with a 500-room hotel. In January 2025 a Community Board 13 committee voted 7 to 2 against it, with one abstention. One supporter said Coney Island had been “promised so much for so many decades, and nothing came about.” On September 29, 2025, a state advisory committee voted 4 to 2 against it. Borough President Antonio Reynoso voted no, saying it “failed to prove itself as a public good.” Politics NY reported that on December 1, 2025, the state gaming location board voted unanimously for the three remaining bids, in the Bronx and Queens. Coney Island was not among them. The report said the state gaming commission would rule within the month. We found no report of that ruling. Brownstoner reported that the City Council's 2025 rezoning for the casino would be reversed. We could not confirm the current zoning.

Today, NYC Parks says all city public beaches are free and open to the public.

Sources

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