Community Corner
The Four Streams of Little Neck Bay
Preservation Committee President's Second In a Six-Part Series on the Formation of Northeast Queens
In the first installment of “The Conservation Conversation,” I described how the continental glaciers of the last ice age bulldozed a huge terminal moraine ahead of them, creating the high ridge that runs east to west through Long Island like a spine.
Once the glaciers retreated, streams flowed downhill towards the newly created Long Island Sound, each carving valleys. The mouths of these valleys eventually flooded as the glacial melt water caused the sea level to rise nearly 400 feet.
In the communities of Douglaston and Little Neck, four streams flowed down from the moraine and, near their mouths, joined into a single large valley to form what we know as Little Neck Bay.
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The largest and most westerly of these streams is Alley Creek, which starts in Alley Pond Park near the top of the moraine, which is close to where Douglaston Parkway meets the Grand Central Parkway.
It crosses under Northern Boulevard next to the Alley Pond Environmental Center and empties into Little Neck Bay just west of the Douglaston Long Island Rail Road station.
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Next is Gabler’s Creek, which runs down from a locale close to where M.S. 67 is located The creek is now primarily underground, but it emerges in Udalls Cove Park just behind the Douglaston Firehouse.
From there it continues through the Udalls Cove Ravine, which is the approximate dividing line between Douglaston and Little Neck. It then passes under the LIRR at 247th Street, flows through Aurora Pond and under Douglaston’s “Back Road” (Sandhill Road) and ultimately reaches the open water of Udalls Cove, which is the eastern arm of Little Neck Bay.
The third stream drains Lake Success. It can be seen from Northern Boulevard, opposite Leonard’s of Great Neck catering hall. Here the stream goes underground and emerges again at Cutter Mill Lane, which is about half way between the Little Neck and Great Neck LIRR stations.
From there it threads its way through the large Udalls Cove salt marsh, passing behind the most northerly homes in Little Neck on 255th Street. It joins Gabler’s Creek just south of Douglaston’s Memorial Field.
The fourth stream drains large parts of Great Neck and enters the Bay near the Great Neck Public Library on Bayview Avenue, which is next to Grist Mill Lane.
Little Neck Bay itself is fairly large. Its mouth is more than a mile across from Fort Totten to Kings Point, where the United States Merchant Marine Academy is located. The head of the bay is two miles south of the Fort at about the location of the Long Island Railroad tracks.
The bay is divided into two arms by the Douglaston peninsula, which juts into it from the south. Read more about it in the next “The Conservation Conversation” on Feb. 14.