Pest Control in Hamilton Heights, Manhattan
Hamilton Heights stretches across a ridge in upper Manhattan roughly from 135th Street to 155th Street, between St. Nicholas Park and the Hudson River. Its streets are lined with handsome rowhouses, especially on Convent Avenue and Hamilton Terrace, as well as prewar apartment buildings along Riverside Drive and Broadway. The Gothic stone buildings of City College of New York crown the hill, and Alexander Hamilton's restored country home, the Hamilton Grange, sits in St. Nicholas Park. Riverbank State Park, built atop a wastewater treatment plant, offers athletic facilities on the Hudson. The neighborhood is home to Dominican, African American and student communities. The 1 on Broadway and the A, B, C and D at 145th Street serve it.
Also known as: Hamilton Grange, West Harlem.
About Hamilton Heights
Alexander Hamilton built his country estate, The Grange, here in 1802, and the area remained rural until elevated trains and the IRT subway arrived at the turn of the twentieth century. Wealthy and middle-class New Yorkers then built rowhouses and apartment buildings. City College moved to its Gothic campus in 1907. Later, the neighborhood became an important center of African American and Dominican life, and historic districts now protect its rowhouses.
Common Pest Problems in Hamilton Heights
Hamilton Heights' century-old rowhouses and apartment buildings sit on rocky ground, with stone foundations, old coal chutes and basement entries that mice readily exploit in fall. Tenements and walk-ups along Amsterdam Avenue and Broadway, often with grocery stores and restaurants on the ground floor, deal with German cockroaches traveling through shared plumbing. Rats forage from trash along the commercial corridors and from the slopes of St. Nicholas Park. Rear yards give them cover.
St. Nicholas Park and Riverside Park's wooded edges host squirrels that sometimes move into rowhouse cornices and roof spaces. Older homes with steam heat and aging bathrooms tend to have silverfish, particularly in basements used for storage. Riverbank State Park and the Hudson waterfront add more habitat for rats, while pigeons roost on the ornate Gothic stonework of City College and on rowhouse cornices, and the busy restaurant scene along Amsterdam Avenue keeps food waste plentiful for rodents at night.