Two Bridges is a neighborhood in the southeastern part of Manhattan in New York City, United States. Although the exact boundaries of the neighborhood are not clearly defined, it is the East River waterfront area, roughly between the Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan Bridge at the southern end of the Lower East Side.
Two Bridges, with its tenements and a high concentration of public housing projects, including the LaGuardia Houses, has traditionally been an immigrant neighborhood, previously populated by immigrants from Europe, more recently from Latin America, and now from China. The Two Bridges Historic District was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in September 2003.
DEMOGRAPHICS
Two Bridges has historically been an Irish and Italian neighborhood, but after the war and the building of public housing high rises in the 1950s, black and Hispanic residents moved into the area. More recently, Two Bridges has been populated by first- and second-generation Chinese immigrants. The shortly-lived Two Bridges Model School District was established in 1967 as an experiment in local control of school districts in a neighborhood that was at the time “35% Chinese and Chinese American, 40% Puerto Rican, 12% white and 12% African American.”The area remains a home to low- to moderate-income families and maintains a reputation for being gritty. Guns N’ Roses guitarist and area resident Richard Fortus called Two Bridges, “the only neighborhood left in Manhattan that doesn’t have a Starbucks”.
However, families and young professionals are arriving in search of deals, and condos with units going for as much as $1.8 million are being built.
As of 2010, is has been the new home of experimental and fringe music venue Downtown Music Gallery.
