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Saw Mill River
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Saw Mill River
The Saw Mill River is a 23.5-mile (37.8 km) tributary of the Hudson River in Westchester County, New York, United States. It flows from an unnamed pond north of Chappaqua to Getty Square in Yonkers, where it empties into the Hudson as that river's southernmost tributary. It is the only major stream in southern Westchester County to drain into the Hudson instead of Long Island Sound. It drains an area of 26.5 square miles (69 km2), most of it heavily developed suburbia. For 16 miles (26 km), it flows parallel to the Saw Mill River Parkway, a commuter artery, an association that has been said to give the river an "identity crisis."
The watershed was settled by the Dutch in the 17th century. The land was long owned by Frederick Philipse I and his descendants as Philipsburg Manor, site of Philipse Manor Hall, until the family lost it at the end of the American Revolution. The land along the river was later divided into multiple towns. Industry in Yonkers developed along the Saw Mill, so polluting the river by the end of the 19th century that a local poet called it a "snake-like yellow scrawl of scum". In the 1920s, the last half-mile (800 m) of the stream was routed into culverts under downtown Yonkers, a process partially reversed in the early 21st century when it became the first major New York waterway to be daylighted.
Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rates the river's last 2.9 miles (4.7 km) as an impaired water body. Plastics are commonly found along the riverbank, and metals from industrial factories are found in the water in high concentrations. Nonetheless, the river is home to species such as the American eel (Anguilla rostrata), which swim upstream to mature and swim back into the Hudson and the ocean in order to breed.
The Saw Mill River rises from a 1.75-acre (7,100 m2) pond in a wooded area of the town of New Castle roughly 2 miles (3.2 km) north of Chappaqua, a one-half mile (800 m) west of Quaker Road (State Route 120/NY 120) and just south of Stony Hollow Road, at an elevation of 490 feet (150 m) above sea level. It wends in a generally southward direction past a cemetery, between hills, and through an area of houses on large wooded lots. Just north of Marcourt Drive, its first crossing, it is impounded to create another small pond. In this area it is frequently channelized and impounded as part of residential landscaping. After crossing under Kipp Street, it bends eastward beneath Quaker Road.
A short channelized portion runs through the front yard of a large house on Quaker southeast of the intersection, after which the river flows back under Quaker and behind the houses on the west side into another impoundment, Chappaqua's Duck Pond. From its outlet it continues southeast between Quaker on its east and Douglas and Mill River roads on the west to the Saw Mill River Parkway. Just west of the Chappaqua train station, it turns southwest to parallel both the parkway and Metro-North Railroad's Harlem Line as both cross into the town of Mount Pleasant. At this point the river is at 340 feet (100 m) in elevation, a loss of 150 feet (46 m) from its source. Just south of the town line, it receives Tertia Brook, its first named tributary, from the east.
A mile past the town line, the river and parkway pass the village of Pleasantville to the east. There the river crosses under the parkway to flow on its west, then crosses and recrosses at the Pleasantville Road (State Route 117) exit. Both make a long turn to the southeast and then back to the southwest around Graham Hills County Park, where it receives Nanny Hagen Brook from the east, before crossing back to the parkway's west in the flood plain around the base of the hills as road, river and rail pass the unincorporated hamlets of Thornwood, and Hawthorne, where the Harlem Line turns to the south.
Just east of the Taconic State Parkway, the river again crosses under the Saw Mill Parkway, then the Taconic. Shortly after that exit it crosses under Saw Mill River Road (State Routes 9A and 100) and some ramps to them from the interchange, then under the Saw Mill Parkway. Both turn south again, then southeast, following the eastern edge of the Pocantico Hills, joined on the west by the North County Trailway bike path, on the right-of-way of the former New York and Putnam Railroad, known as the "Old Put".
The river crosses under the parkway again to form the eastern edge of a plant nursery on Saw Mill River Road, then recrosses as the river, bike path, parkway and Saw Mill River Road all bend around the northwest corner of Eastview, where the Saw Mill drops below 200 feet (61 m) in elevation, a loss of 100 feet (30 m) since Chappaqua. A turn back to the southwest around Tarrytown Lakes County Park puts the river at the outskirts of Elmsford. There it receives Mine Brook from the east.
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Saw Mill River
The Saw Mill River is a 23.5-mile (37.8 km) tributary of the Hudson River in Westchester County, New York, United States. It flows from an unnamed pond north of Chappaqua to Getty Square in Yonkers, where it empties into the Hudson as that river's southernmost tributary. It is the only major stream in southern Westchester County to drain into the Hudson instead of Long Island Sound. It drains an area of 26.5 square miles (69 km2), most of it heavily developed suburbia. For 16 miles (26 km), it flows parallel to the Saw Mill River Parkway, a commuter artery, an association that has been said to give the river an "identity crisis."
The watershed was settled by the Dutch in the 17th century. The land was long owned by Frederick Philipse I and his descendants as Philipsburg Manor, site of Philipse Manor Hall, until the family lost it at the end of the American Revolution. The land along the river was later divided into multiple towns. Industry in Yonkers developed along the Saw Mill, so polluting the river by the end of the 19th century that a local poet called it a "snake-like yellow scrawl of scum". In the 1920s, the last half-mile (800 m) of the stream was routed into culverts under downtown Yonkers, a process partially reversed in the early 21st century when it became the first major New York waterway to be daylighted.
Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rates the river's last 2.9 miles (4.7 km) as an impaired water body. Plastics are commonly found along the riverbank, and metals from industrial factories are found in the water in high concentrations. Nonetheless, the river is home to species such as the American eel (Anguilla rostrata), which swim upstream to mature and swim back into the Hudson and the ocean in order to breed.
The Saw Mill River rises from a 1.75-acre (7,100 m2) pond in a wooded area of the town of New Castle roughly 2 miles (3.2 km) north of Chappaqua, a one-half mile (800 m) west of Quaker Road (State Route 120/NY 120) and just south of Stony Hollow Road, at an elevation of 490 feet (150 m) above sea level. It wends in a generally southward direction past a cemetery, between hills, and through an area of houses on large wooded lots. Just north of Marcourt Drive, its first crossing, it is impounded to create another small pond. In this area it is frequently channelized and impounded as part of residential landscaping. After crossing under Kipp Street, it bends eastward beneath Quaker Road.
A short channelized portion runs through the front yard of a large house on Quaker southeast of the intersection, after which the river flows back under Quaker and behind the houses on the west side into another impoundment, Chappaqua's Duck Pond. From its outlet it continues southeast between Quaker on its east and Douglas and Mill River roads on the west to the Saw Mill River Parkway. Just west of the Chappaqua train station, it turns southwest to parallel both the parkway and Metro-North Railroad's Harlem Line as both cross into the town of Mount Pleasant. At this point the river is at 340 feet (100 m) in elevation, a loss of 150 feet (46 m) from its source. Just south of the town line, it receives Tertia Brook, its first named tributary, from the east.
A mile past the town line, the river and parkway pass the village of Pleasantville to the east. There the river crosses under the parkway to flow on its west, then crosses and recrosses at the Pleasantville Road (State Route 117) exit. Both make a long turn to the southeast and then back to the southwest around Graham Hills County Park, where it receives Nanny Hagen Brook from the east, before crossing back to the parkway's west in the flood plain around the base of the hills as road, river and rail pass the unincorporated hamlets of Thornwood, and Hawthorne, where the Harlem Line turns to the south.
Just east of the Taconic State Parkway, the river again crosses under the Saw Mill Parkway, then the Taconic. Shortly after that exit it crosses under Saw Mill River Road (State Routes 9A and 100) and some ramps to them from the interchange, then under the Saw Mill Parkway. Both turn south again, then southeast, following the eastern edge of the Pocantico Hills, joined on the west by the North County Trailway bike path, on the right-of-way of the former New York and Putnam Railroad, known as the "Old Put".
The river crosses under the parkway again to form the eastern edge of a plant nursery on Saw Mill River Road, then recrosses as the river, bike path, parkway and Saw Mill River Road all bend around the northwest corner of Eastview, where the Saw Mill drops below 200 feet (61 m) in elevation, a loss of 100 feet (30 m) since Chappaqua. A turn back to the southwest around Tarrytown Lakes County Park puts the river at the outskirts of Elmsford. There it receives Mine Brook from the east.
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