Inwood Smokestacks Are Coming Down After 88 Years

INWOOD, NY — The three smokestacks that have towered over Inwood for nearly 90 years are coming down in the "next several weeks" due to a wind incident in 2020, a spokesperson from the Department of Sanitation told Patch.

Questions from community members arose after scaffolding and construction gear recently went up around the smokestacks located on 215th Street, near 10th Avenue.

The stacks will be demolished, the DSNY spokesperson said.

DSNY did not say exactly what happened in the 2020 wind incident that necessitated the stacks to be demolished.

The smokestacks are part of a decommissioned Department of Sanitation plant that opened in 1934 and incinerated roughly 7,500 tons of city garbage a day, according to MyInwood.net.

The plant was closed in 1970, with its daily garbage load getting rerouted to Fresh Kills landfill site on Staten Island, MyInwood.net wrote.

The closure came amid calls for improved air quality and a push to improve pollution.

The site is still used in the present day as a base for Department of Sanitation administration, storage, and parking.

"A shame," Cole Thompson, an Upper Manhattan resident and historian told Patch. "They added a unique element to the local skyline. The stacks made you think of an earlier, though certainly polluted, time.

"They also remind me of the album cover for Pink Floyd's 'Animals.'"

You can find out more about the complete history of the Inwood smokestacks in the article — "Inwood’s 215th Street Incinerator Smokestacks."