The is 1.8 miles long, and seven bridges and viaducts cross it between and the bay. The turns off to the east.
Edwin Litchfield straightened Gowanus Creek into the canal in the 1860s and industry came in behind him. Lumber and coal and stone came off the barges, and coal gas was made beside it. The combined sewers still empty into it when it rains. It was listed as a Superfund site in 2010 and the dredging is not finished.
Along the banks most of the buildings are one and two stories, with lumber yards and metal shops among them. at 322 Third Avenue was the Brooklyn Rapid Transit company's power station, built between 1901 and 1904. It sat empty from 1972 and reopened as workshops in 2023.
The is the oldest of the four retractile bridges left in the country. The deck is timber and a sign on it still warns of a five dollar penalty for driving faster than a walk. It reopened on June 15, 2026 after five years of repairs. Cars are not allowed on it now. It opens for twenty minutes at a time to let the cleanup barges through.
The F and G trains cross above all of this on the . stands 87.5 feet up, the highest in the subway. The platform looks out over the neighborhood.
That view is changing. A rezoning in November 2021 allowed 8,500 apartments here. The towers are going up along the water.
