Bill Rainey Park

Bill Rainey Park is a one-acre neighborhood park at East 170th Street and College Avenue in the Morrisania section of the South Bronx. Named for a local community activist, the park provides recreation space in one of the most historically significant neighborhoods in the borough.

Morrisania takes its name from the Morris family, whose estate once covered much of what is now the southwestern Bronx. The neighborhood was the birthplace of Gouverneur Morris, a Founding Father who wrote the final draft of the United States Constitution and is credited with penning much of the document's famous preamble.

The South Bronx experienced devastating decline in the 1960s and 1970s, with widespread arson, abandonment, and population loss that made the area a national symbol of urban crisis. The rebuilding of the South Bronx over the subsequent decades has been one of the most remarkable stories of urban recovery in American history.

The park features a playground, basketball courts, and seating areas serving the surrounding community. In a neighborhood where the rebuilding process has produced new housing but limited new parkland, existing parks are essential community resources.

Bill Rainey Park serves a community that has rebuilt itself from the ashes of the 1970s, providing everyday green space in a neighborhood whose resilience and determination have proven that even the most devastated urban areas can be revived.