Yale-International Alley,
Trumbull St. x Whitney Ave.

The invisible streets
of New Haven

Exploring the alleys of the Elm City

Ali Hafez

Around the world, some of the most iconic and charming cities are known for their alleyways.


Corniglia, Italy

Cordoba, Spain

Cairo, Egypt

At first glance, New Haven's alleys might not seem to be quite on the same level...




...but the reality is that these spaces are charming, interesting, and important, for those who use them.

The alley we walked through in the intro -- we can call that Yale-International alley, since...

it lies right here, right next to the Yale-International Center. And it's a very high-traffic alleyway. People want to get places.

"Why were you walking through this alley?"

"It's much faster"

"The place I'm going is right here"

"For the speed!"

And it's clearly an important shortcut -- an important alley. Despite having no official name, a sign greets travelers on either end. It usually goes unacknowledged.

Some alleys have names, signs, high traffic. Some don't. Regardless, they all tell a story.

Let's read them.

While New Haven is known for a lot — Apizza, Yale, Elm trees — its alleys are not usually one of them.

but these alleys form an entire navigable network of invisible paths, traversing and snaking through the city.


Merriam-Webster defines an alley as "a walk bordered by trees or bushes; a narrow street"

Elihu Rubin, Yale Professor of Urban Studies, describes them as "an urban morphological quality" often for access to garages and trash pickup.

But we're going to broadly define an alley to include a wide variety of places like these.


Alexander
Walk

Burgerway Alley

Pitkin Plaza


All these alleys have heavily restricted or no car traffic -- which makes them quieter, more peaceful, and feel more human.

And these many alleys come in many shapes and sizes.

Some of which are wide and can even fit cars and trucks...

others are narrow and might require a little shimmying to fit through...

and most others lie somewhere in between.





Almost all these alleys are quiet,


host public art,



often contain greenery,


and are places to socialize.

And some days, an alley can truly show itself off as a truly exceptional place, and blossom...

The alley I just showed you was New Haven's Court Street, a quaint alley in the Wooster Square neighborhood, lined with townhouses. The alley is usually quiet, but on Sunday, April 14th, the alley was bustling with activity for New Haven's Cherry Blossom festival.

Despite all of these wonderful places,
I couldn't get into some alleys at all.

No matter how beautiful they looked from the outside,

Their entrances were locked behind gates.

Cutting these spaces off.

>

My favorite alley is Court St.

I made a friend there, I've sat down and enjoyed the weather, biked through it as a shortcut, and countless others have enjoyed it in a million other ways.

"Why were you walking through this alley?"

"Searching for a bumblebee on a purple flower"

She was inspired by a poem with a similar visual.

"We live nearby, it's beautiful; it's safer, without cars, and it's quieter."

She was really hoping I was an urban planner for New Haven, here to build more bike lanes.

"It's warm enough for me to weed the planters."

He explained that each resident of Court St eventually comes to maintaining a part of the alley.

And everyone can find a way to enjoy each and every one of these alleys, too.