Fresh Kills

Fresh Kills (from the Middle Dutch word kille, meaning "riverbed" or "water channel") is a stream and freshwater estuary in the western portion of the New York City borough of Staten Island. It is the site of the Fresh Kills Landfill, formerly New York City's principal landfill.

The watershed (basin) of the Fresh Kills drains much of the wet lowlands of the western portion of the island and flows into the Arthur Kill around the Isle of Meadows. The channel around the north end of the Isle of Meadows is sometimes called Little Fresh Kill and the southern channel is called Great Fresh Kill.

The stream has two major branches. The north branch is Main Creek. The south branch is Richmond Creek, which drains much of the central part of the island, with its headwaters near Historic Richmond Town, on the southern end of the terminal moraine of the island. The system of streams provides recreational kayaking and wildlife viewing in the preserved wetlands.

Fresh Kills Landfill

The Fresh Kills Landfill was a landfill covering 2,200 acres (890 ha) in the New York City borough of Staten Island in the United States. The name comes from the landfill's location along the banks of the Fresh Kills estuary in western Staten Island.

The landfill was opened in 1947 as a temporary landfill but became New York City's principal landfill in the second half of the 20th century. It was once the largest landfill, as well as human-made structure, in the world. In October 2008, reclamation of the site began on a multi-phase, 30-year site development for reuse as Freshkills Park.

History

Opening

The landfill opened in 1947 in what was then a rural agricultural area. The initial plan for a temporary landfill called for Fresh Kills to be used for 20 years, then developed as a multiuse area with residential, recreational, and industrial components.

At the peak of its operation, the contents of twenty barges – each carrying 650 tons of garbage – were added to the site every day. In 2001 it was estimated that, if kept open, the landfill would have eventually become the highest point on the East Coast. Under local pressure and with support of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the landfill site was closed on March 22, 2001, though it was temporarily reopened soon after for the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center in Manhattan (see below).