With how hard we New Yorkers work day in and day out, we’ll take anything we can that makes us our lives easier. And if there’s one thing about us it’s that we’re a sucker for an interactive map, and we just got our hands on a new one! This one doesn’t define NYC’s neighborhood borders or show what New York would look like if it was underwater, though (which is, by the way, quite unsettling). Rather, it reveals the 2,500 streets, parks, and other locations around the city named for famous New Yorkers.
NYC’s Department of Records and Information Services (DORIS) created the NYC Honorary Street Names Map back in November 2024, and though we told you guys all about it back in November, they recently upgraded it to make searches easier than ever before! The upgrades include:
- Enhanced search features
- A website address that’s easier to remember
A fabulous tool for historians, researchers, students, and anyone interested in the city’s history, the map shows the names and biographical information (such as the location, borough, year of enactment, and the Council Members who introduced them) for streets across the city that have been co-named by the City Council.
For example, the map informs users that the intersection of 32nd Street and Ditmars Boulevard in Astoria, co-named “Tony Bennett Place,” honors the iconic Tony Bennett, who grew up in an apartment building near the very same intersection.
Accessible on both computers and mobile devices, the map was created following the passage of a bill introduced by Council Member Gale Brewer. At the time of the its creation, Brewer stated:
Our City’s history is long and deep, and we need tools to remember those who came before us—whether their name is on a building or on a street sign— and why they’re being honored. Think of this as Wikipedia for street names!
Now, how do you use it? Well, there are several ways. Users can either enter the honoree’s name right in the search bar to locate a specific individual, search a specific zip code to find all the co-named streets in that area, or enter specific key words, such as “firefighter.” The tool will then search the 2,500 streets, parks, and other locales around the city that match your search.
Typically the Council passes two local laws each year that list the biographical information and locations of co-named streets within the five boroughs. The map includes all data from those laws for the period 2001 through 2024–currently, there are 2,496 entries: 1,610 of which are co-named intersections, and 886 co-named streets.
DORIS will continue to update the map quarterly. It’s also working to include the approximately 400 streets that were co-named in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attack, for which biographical information is required. Explore the map for yourself here.
While we’re at it, find some of our other favorite interactive NYC maps below:
- This one that shows every open bathroom in NYC
- This one that shows you exactly where Mister Softee is in the city during the warmer months
- This one that helps you explore all of NYC’s colorful subway art
- This one that unveils NYC’s coldest day of the year